


Where We Went

by InterNutter



Series: Dibbles [2]
Category: Church (Short Film 2019)
Genre: Assumptions AU, Blood and Gore, F/M, Found Family, Gen, Lagenam Lives, Language Gap, Magical Neutering, Major Character Injury, Miscarriage mention, Mutual Pining, Objectification, Panic Attacks, Puberty 2.0, Self-Harm, Sickness, Victim Blaming, long fic is long
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-08
Updated: 2019-12-17
Packaged: 2021-01-25 18:18:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 24
Words: 36,208
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21360616
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/InterNutter/pseuds/InterNutter
Summary: A sequel to What Went Wrong, aka “Dibbles” during the writing thereof. Welcome to “Dibbles 2: The Saga Continues”. Because I can’t leave this shit alone, apparently. Continuing on with my Assumptions AU.
Relationships: Ashivon & Tselah, Sanga & Tselah, Sanga/Ashivon
Series: Dibbles [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1539889
Comments: 20
Kudos: 51





	1. Chapter 1

Tselah woke with arms around him and bodies as his pillow. They didn’t smell like family, and for a moment, he was afraid. Then he remembered the horrors of the night before. The bleeding grownup, yelling at him to run. The fight. The strangers. The long hours of running and hiding and more running until…

He opened his eyes.

Until this place. An overgrown room or house or something like it, held together by the trees, vines and weeds that were also threatening to pull it apart. The sunlight scattered through the concealing leaves and made Tselah think of hide-and-hunt back home.

Wherever home was.

There was the grownup, big and muscular and tough. He had to be tough, because Tselah had seen him burning and bleeding as he fought those strange, glowing ropes. Then there was the furless one. Short and strange and vicious. They had to be vicious, because Tselah had seen them fighting their own kind.

They were both asleep, wounds scabbed over since the fight in the night. The furless one leaning on the grownup’s shoulder and the grownup leaning on the furless’ head. They still held each other’s hands, under Tselah’s body.

They had run a lot, last night, and the grownup had carried Tselah for most of it. Sometimes, he carried the furless one. They needed more sleep. Tselah, on the other hand, needed to pee.

Very carefully, he slid out from within their arms and crept around the ruin. There were just walls left, and holes that had either been doors or windows in an ancient past. None of them had been a bathroom or a privy, from what he could tell. He edged outside, cautiously checking for signs of life, and quickly found a tree, then dug a little hole.

Birdsong and wind in the trees. The gentle trickle of a nearby stream. The smell of his own offense. Nothing dangerous. Nothing like… that night. He buried his leavings and found the stream to wash his hands, and looking around found nothing he recognised as food. Tselah retraced his steps to the odd couple. They would be hungry, too. They would be wanting food and drink and they probably wouldn’t want to stay here. This was a dead place. Nobody wanted to live in a dead place.

The grownup moved his arms. Startled awake. “Baby!” He saw Tselah and relaxed.

The furless stirred, too. “Ashivon?  _ What’shappening? Where--? Oh.” _

Tselah could guess at the meaning behind that ‘Oh’. They were somewhere strange with a little stranger and no food and enemies probably chasing them by now and no clue as to where to go or what to do next. Tselah  _ felt _ that ‘Oh’ in his heart.

“I’m hungry,” he complained.

The grownup’s stomach growled in an echo, and the furless sighed. The furless stretched and pulled themself up, murmuring noises of complaint. The surprise was when she said, “Stay,” in Intsehli.

“You speak Intsehli? Why didn’t you before? What’s wrong with the grownup?”

“Stay,” they said, motioning with their hands to sit put.

Oh. They only understood a few words of Intsehli. Tselah drooped, left with the grownup, who was also stretching and murmuring. “Do you know what’s happened?”

The grownup tapped his chest and said, “Ashivon.”

Tselah repeated the sign and said “Tselah.”

“Tselah,” Ashivon repeated. “No hurt Tselah. Sanga,” pointing in the direction the furless went, “grab food.”

That… wasn’t quite an answer. “Those people in the big house were bad, weren’t they?”

“People,” Ashivon said. “Bad.”

He, too, barely spoke Intsehli. Tselah curled up on himself and tried not to cry. He was a big boy, now, almost six whole years old! He could wash and dress himself and brush his own teeth and tie his own sash and everything. He could even read, though very slowly. He shouldn’t cry. He was almost grown.

Warm hands brushed over his head, and down his back. When Tselah looked, Ashivon was gently petting him, clearly uncertain about what was allowed. Tselah helped him decide by diving into his arms. Ashivon nuzzled at him and purred and their tails twined together. Tselah knew he was in a strange place with strangers and things could be dangerous in this alien land, but everything felt so much better with someone’s arms around him and someone’s purr in his ears.

Tselah’s fingers found the edges of Ashivon’s wounds, and shrank away. They had to hurt, but he hadn’t cried about it, not once. Tselah had to wonder if he ever cried at all.

Sanga came back. They had turned their red part into a sort of apron-basket and their tie into a bundle holder. There was grass and sticks in there. Sanga was smiling. “Grab many,” they said.

Down went the collection, furless hands sorting through everything. They spoke as they worked. Alien words, peppered with some in Intsehli.

* * *

“Here we have sticks, twigs, and tinder, I’ll be starting a fire later.  _ Burn,” _ said Sanga. She didn’t expect her demons to know what she was saying, but she knew that children were quicker at talking when people talked to them. “I found some flints, so we’re going to be okay for fire and tools. There’s some cattails, we can  _ eat _ those… not yet.  _ Bad now, good not-now. _ These bits of bark look like they can make some decent string. I’ve got to find or make something to cook in, we can roast a lot of this, all the same.”

Both Ashivon and their new little friend were staring in wonder as Sanga sorted things. One of the cattails was mature and she made the pod produce fluff for extra tinder, something the little one found hilarious. She learned his name - Tselah - and the word for ‘soft’.

She said,  _ “Big loud no hurt,” _ before she struck one flint with another to make sparks into her tinder. All the same, it hurt her heart to watch Ashivon flinch at the sound. Sanga soon had a fire going in the ancient hearth, and some katniss and other things roasting in the flames.

She tore the bark into fibres, something her demons grinned to help her with, and hiked up a pants leg to spin them into thread. Spin down, ply up. Knot the ends just to be sure. Roll the finished product into a ball. Life was so much surer with a ball of string.

Finally, tool making. Sanga had spent a lot of time in Pennance, doing awful work. Some of it included knapping blades of volcanic glass for surgeries in the hospice. Having a knife would be a good thing. Having an axe would be better. She did her best to warn Ashivon and, when she was done making noise, reached out to hold him, repeating,  _ “No hurt, no hurt,” _ over and over.

He soon relaxed into her grasp. So did Tselah. Sanga hadn’t realised how much joy it was to hold someone who wanted to hold her. She hardly wanted to let them go. She had to, to get their food out of the fire.

The roast turned out… edible. She had a lot to learn about cooking by an open fire. Ashivon didn’t seem to mind, but poor little Tselah was a little bit more picky.

“There’s so much to do,” she prattled. “We need a water vessel, we need tools. We’ll need clothing. I can’t keep turning my vest around, sooner or later someone’s going to see my mark…” She touched it. Ow. “We’re going to have to clean our wounds. We have to keep moving if we want to avoid pursuers.”

Ashivon didn’t understand her words, but he understood her tone. He cuddled up close to her and held her hand, purring all the time. He didn’t have the words for it, but she could read that as,  _ I trust you. I have faith in you. _

With that immense trust, Sanga’s world felt a little better.

Ashivon startled out of their embrace, creeping over to peek out of a window. Sanga held tight to Tselah and shoosh-shooshed at him. Minutes passed so slowly, and Ashivon was still as a statue. Finally, he ducked down and whispered, “Sanga…” He gestured her closer.

_ “Stay,” _ she whispered to Tselah, gesturing for him to hunker down. She crept up to Ashivon. “What?”

He pointed to the window. “Big,” he whispered.

She peeked. It was a cow. She relaxed.  _ “No bad,” _ she announced.  _ “Big food.” _

Ashivon didn’t need to be told twice. He was out the window in a flash and stalking through the grass.

Sanga turned away from the view. It would take months to make leather, but only hours to cook all that meat. Possibly minutes for Ashivon and Tselah to eat it.

There was a startled shriek from the cow, and a thud, then some peculiar noises. Sanga peeked again and saw that Ashivan was rolling the body towards their hiding place. A cow was a lot of dead weight. It would leave a path no matter what they did.

Butchering the animal was grizzly work, and Sanga was used to it. She’d butchered many things for the Church, though she didn’t always know what they were when she was cutting them into gobbets. It was Tselah, the clever lad, who hit on the idea of suspending meat above the flames with sticks. Ashivon gnawed on the first bone Sanga freed and made faces at the taste.

_ “Fire grab more good,” _ she said in his tongue. She didn’t have enough of his words to say,  _ Cook it first, _ and the Church had been feeding him raw… flesh… for years.

Two hungry demons and a forsaken Nun couldn’t eat  _ all _ of the cow, though it was a close thing. Even Ashivon’s perpetual hunger seemed sated. Sanga sliced the rest into strips and cooked it until it was relatively dry. That, and the tools, they would have to take with them.

_ If she still had her Nun’s headwrap, she could make something of a bag out of it. _

She had very little, actually. Stone tools and string, and whatever knowledge she had gleaned out of her pennances in the scriptorium… She knew the Church would be chasing them. If word got out about their escape, the entire land could riot.

Best not to let them get caught.

She took off her vest and waistband. Knotted string could turn it into something of a bag, and she was already in trouble for the escape. No-one was about to flay her for being under-dressed when they could burn her for consorting with demons.

They weren’t demons anyway. They were something else, perhaps, but they were also people.

When there was nothing left of the cow but skin and bones, and everything else had been packed away, Sanga started off. Ashivon’s hand in hers, and little Tselah holding his other one. She had no destination but ‘away’, and she would follow it until she was sure they would all be safe.

The Church said their reach went all over the world.

The Church also said that demons were vicious, bloodthirsty animals.

The Church might be lying about everything.


	2. Chapter 2

Just when Ashivon was getting used to her touch, Sanga let him go so she could gather things. Reeds, mostly. Grass, as he understood it. With some in hand, she bent and twisted and worked at it, pulling or cutting more as she made… something. It couldn’t be a net, but it seemed to work like a net. She worked and walked as she worked, all through the remains of the day, but not past dark, when her hand joined his again and she stepped more carefully.

It was when she stumbled over something she should have seen that Ashivon knew. She couldn’t see in the night. He scooped her up in his arms, letting Tselah hold onto his tail as they travelled.

Sanga’s arms moved, feeling him out. Running her hands across his fur, combing her fingers through his hair. Rubbing his horns and ears a little before settling into a firm grip around his shoulders.

The smile came so naturally that he wasn’t even aware of it until his face started to hurt, and he didn’t care. The purr that began with her closeness sounded louder in the silent, sacred night. There were none around to hear him but Sanga and Tselah, the two he cared about the most.

_ Peasant farmers on the outskirts of Vardel were driven to terror, that night. They all reported seeing glowing lights in the night and hearing and unearthly, growling sort of noise. By the time the inquisitors came, there was nothing left but the mandatory witch hunts to investigate. _

Tselah was smiling, too. He had to trot to keep up, and Ashivon measured his pace a little more when he realised. Little legs had to do twice the walking that grown legs did. His white fur reflected the moonlight, making him shine like a treasure.

How anyone with a heart could bear to hurt such a child was beyond Ashivon. They had hurt him, all the same, when he was a child. Hurt him and kept him hungry and fed him their own dead. Kept him alone.

Sanga’s fingers stroked his fur and played with his hair. It was the best feeling in Ashivon’s existence. No bars to hold him, no furless to chastise her. Free.

Free to touch. Free to hold. Free to help each other as best they could.

It took until the moon was high for Tselah to tire. Ashivon carried him, too, until he found a little cavern big enough to hide them all. There, they curled up around each other and drifted into sleep. Unprepared and unconcerned about the risks of the morrow.

Sanga woke him nearer to dawn with a squeeze of her arms around him and a brush of her hand through his hair and over an ear.  _ “Sanga grab food, burn,”  _ she said. They had few words together, but they made them work.

“Stay on guard,” he said in her tongue.

He smile was worth the world to him. The world and more. There was also the baby in his arms. Well. Not truly a baby. A child. Ashivon wrapped as much of himself around Tselah as he could.

_ He had been apart from his parents when the light took him. His mother had tried to snatch him out of it, and gained hurts for her trouble. _

It wasn’t much logic or reason, but it simply made sense to stay close to this child in order to protect him. It was a need greater than his perpetual hunger. Keep him safe. Make certain that nightmare place can’t ever snatch him back.

His sleep was fitful, disturbed by any close noise or Tselah’s murmurings. Exhausting, for that fitfulness. It was therefore more than alarming to wake to find his arms empty.  _ “BABY!” _ He startled out of sleep, heart already pounding. Looking out of their cave and into the light for any sign...

Sanga’s voice said,  _ “Baby here. Tselah here.” _

Deeper inside, where the firelight revealed darker tunnels going down and up and sideways, Sanga had found a metal container, more bucket than cauldron, and was showing Tselah the finer points of preparing meat.

Ashivon’s heart nearly burst with a combination of relief and pride. “Sanga kill?”

There was a head, burning in the coals. A goat. He knew this animal from his distant childhood. Something so familiar it almost hurt. They had goats in the furless lands! A hint of home…

But he didn’t remember what they did with goats. Just that they were there, when he was small.

Tselah was picking up furless-talk, far faster than Ashivon ever had. Then again, Tselah wasn’t kept in a cage and taught in rushed lessons. “Cook bone,” he insisted. “Good eat.”

Sanga shrugged.  _ “You say, I do.” _ She had picked up a little Intsehli.  _ “Sanga no eat bone… all life.” _ Though she hadn’t done it well.

Ashivon remembered more and more of it, the more Tselah talked, the more it came back to him. He was leaping ahead of Sanga and had to slow his words down for her, sometimes. More often than not, as time went on.

She refused to be frustrated or angry about it and Ashivon admired her for just that. She knew what she was doing with herself. Her woven constructions were sort of baskets they could wear on their backs. A large one for him, a small one for Tselah, and a moderate one for herself. They would need it, too. They would need supplies if they were to traverse this cavern in the hope of a shortcut underground.

Sanga explained, through pantomime, drawings, and Tselah’s translations, that the smoke told her there was another way out of their current cave. If they could go  _ through _ the mountain, then the place they just escaped would have no idea where they were. All they had to do was follow the smoke.

They’d need light. Ashivon and Tselah could see in the moonlight, but the complete dark of the cave had them just as blind as Sanga was at night.

There  _ was _ an old farmhouse, where Sanga had found their stewpot and the goat. It seemed abandoned, since the goats were wild and the actual farmlands were overgrown. If there was anywhere that would have what they needed, it would be there.

By the time she was done planning, the stew - or what passed for one - was done. The meat was cooked so much that it barely stayed on the bone, and Ashivon loved it. Actual cooked meat was so much better than the horrible stuff they had forced on him back there.

They had wide leaves for plates, and Sanga served with sticks shorn clean of their bark. She blew on the chunks to cool them, but Ashivon didn’t care. Hot was good. Cooked was better. The things she had found to add to the pot… he had no words for it, but they had to be the best.

It was Tselah, who had managed to get a chunk of goat with the bone still in, who took the naked skeleton part into his mouth and  _ bit. _

KRAK!

Ashivon flinched at the noise and then gaped in wonder as a small child used claws and teeth to split open the bone and get into the marrow with a delighted purr. Amazed, he retrieved his own bone from a pile of rejects and tried it for himself.

KRAK!

Some levering, a little chewing, and -yes!-  _ this _ was what he’d been missing in his life. His purr sounded loud in the cave as Sanga boggled at them both. “Good,” he told her in her words. “Much many good. Ashivon much like.”

_ “Sanga little frighten,” _ she said in his words.  _ “Ashivon liking, Sanga grow liking.” _

To try and help her in that goal, he did his utmost to mute the noises of cracking open bones.

The goat head, roasted in the coals, provided some extra protein in the form of its brains. Tselah refused to touch them so he and Sanga shared them out of the skull thanks to flat spoons she must have carved.

The goat meat did not last long, not with three hungry mouths to feed. In the waning light of the day, they made it to the abandoned farmhouse looking for anything useful. The place had been ransacked before. Everything was tossed around, but many things were left in place. Trenchers, which Sanga added to her back-basket. Rags, which she added to his. There was no food and no coin left, but there were candles, lying in a box in a neglected corner of a small store-space. Those went into Tselah’s pack. What cloth that wasn’t rag had been chewed into rag or otherwise destroyed by the animals that ventured within. The surviving farm animals were mostly goats. There were some...  _ pigs, _ Sanga called them, who rooted about in the dirt with their snouts. The rest were sad skeletons, scattered about in the rotting enclosures where they had died. Too stupid or too dependent to try an escape.

_ Pig, _ Sanga said, went rotten too easily, and would take days upon days to hunt. Goat, on the other hand, could be cooked to near rock-hard dryness and make halfway decent travel rations. Or so she hoped.

The more they attempted to be ready for this venture, the less safe it seemed. Ashivon worried at every noise that didn’t seem like it belonged. Fretted every time birds took wing anywhere in sight.

Nevertheless, going through the mountains instead of around or over them meant that they had an advantage over anyone who would be hunting them.

Sanga showed them how to make a frame out of two sticks and string, to help drag heavy burdens across the ground. Though it was easier than rolling a body, he had to worry that they were leaving a trail for someone to follow.

It took them two days of eating  _ pig _ and curing goat flesh, but they were ready. One candle, and following the smoke, hand in hand.

Unfortunately, the smoke went through a tiny hole that even Tselah couldn’t fit through. Sanga didn’t give up, seeking other ways through via the branch-ways. They found a pit, a winding tunnel that had foul-smelling air and, just when there were barely enough candles to make it back to their original entrance, another way out just big enough for Tselah and Sanga.

They attacked that hole, digging and scraping and heaving at enormous rocks. Ashivon had no desire to turn back and risk capture, neither did Sanga.

Finally, as the sun threatened to creep below the horizon, Ashivon struggled through that gap. Sanga and Tselah pulling on one arm. Him pushing and fighting with his other arm and both legs. Bruised, scraped, sweaty and filthy, he was free of that terrible dark hole.

In that laughing victory, half hysterical, he and Sanga kissed for the first time since they left their prison.

No lightning strike harmed them, this time, and the warmth of her against him was more than sustenance for his tattered soul. He gathered her close against him, fought laughter as Tselah squirmed into the embrace, all sharp corners and happy purring.

_ “What was that?” _ the child asked.  _ “Is that how the furless make friends? Is it a super happy thing? What’s it called?” _

Sanga broke, giggling at the child. Ruffling his growing hair and laying her lips on his brow. They ate the last of the goat by the light of the moon and the stars, Sanga telling an old tale about the shapes in the sky, and Tselah translating.

_ Once, in the long-long ago, the Saint had control of a mighty warrior… _

As they lay together on the mossy hillocks, limbs wrapped around each other, Ashivon imagined little differences. Sanga as her  _ Saint, _ and himself as her warrior, fighting together against the hordes of wickedness… in his mind, the furless who hurt them both.

He never knew when he fell asleep, that night, but his dreams were full of the justice he’d never seen in his waking life.


	3. Chapter 3

Tselah woke early, as the sunshine began to paint the landscape in all colours. Green, for the trees poking up out of the mist, gold in the mist, as the sunshine caught in the fine haze of cloud too lazy to fly in the sky. Little black spots of distant birds skimming above, dodging this way and that as they circled and turned. Red and yellow and blue, as the crowning roofs of scattered buildings breached the sea of mists below them.

There were people down there.

For a minute, maybe five, Tselah wanted to imagine that there were Intseh down there. Waking up and going about their business. Making breakfast or sharing morning games. Siblings tousling in their nests as their parents or caregivers exchanged morning pleasantness.

But those weren’t Intseh buildings. Those looked too much like the angular blocks the furless loved to build.

Soon, too soon, the mist would rise or fade away. Too soon, someone might wonder about the distant figures on the hillside. Too soon, they would be running, again.

He was tired of running. He was tired of not knowing where his next meal would come from. He was not, he had to admit, tired of either Ashivon’s or Sanga’s constant touch, but he did want to be home. He wanted to be back with his family. He wanted to be sure that there would be no more adventures, no more fear, no more running.

Tselah had to confess that he wanted Sanga and Ashivon there, too. He couldn’t quite figure out how that would work, but he couldn’t picture going home without them there. They had, after all, saved him. The scars on Ashivon’s back told of exactly what they had saved him from.

He hadn’t realised he was weeping until Ashivon woke and curled himself around Tselah. Ashivon’s low, steady purr helped Tselah out of any bad mood.

Sanga woke soon after and, after some of their weird  _ kisses _ and hugs to each, took one look at the valley below and drew the same conclusions T’selah had.

They picked their way around on the hills and mountainside, gathering what useful things they knew. Going carefully because no road had ever been made where they walked. On one hand, that meant that the mean people couldn’t easily follow. On the other hand… it meant that they all couldn’t easily lead.

They could wash, what with the clean mountain streams, but they were also ice cold. Sanga took care to wash hers and Ashivon’s scars while Tselah splashed about, being as quick as he could to get as clean as possible with minimal loss of body heat.

The sunshine was warm and the mountainsides seemed only populated with goats. Three or four of those made a meal and supplies for the next leg of their journey. They even managed to avoid a few herdsmen, skirting around them and their dogs.

Once the mist cleared from the valley, they could see a wide road that snaked through it, guardhouses positioned at regular intervals. Tselah could see symbols like the one on Sanga’s chest, only without the scar running through it. When he told this to Sanga and Ashivon, they were even more cautious about staying hidden.

That was a long, lean, hungry week. They only came down out of the mountains and the foothills when there were no longer any signs of civilisation. Tselah was glad when Ashivon brought down one of the herd-beasts in the grasslands, and even happier when they cooked it together.

Ashivon and Sanga could eat all the brains and tongue they liked. Tselah preferred meat and marrow with whatever vegetables they could find.

Not that there were many, in the grasslands. The few shrubs that had fruit were nests of thorns that even birds got trapped in, and the blood they made Sanga shed gave Ashivon trouble. The red mark on his arm lit up, somehow, glowing and fading like the beat of a heart. Sanga seemed to know what it was, and carefully positioned herself downwind until the blood stopped flowing.

“That mark,” she told Tselah, drawing a diamond on her own forearm in echo of Ashivon’s mark, “it has a magic. It makes Ashivon crave blood and get angry enough to kill. It’s… It’s a very bad mark.”

Tselah provided translation for Ashivon, of course. This was about him and it was rude to leave him out of the discussion.

He, in turn, stared at the mark on his arm.  _ “I hate this thing,” _ he said.  _ “I’ve always hated it. It’s made me… I’m not Intseh, not truly.” _

Sanga, once she heard the translation, touched the healing scar on her chest. A line of new, pink skin and scabs broke the strange symbol of the bad people in two.  _ “Cut mark,” _ she said.  _ “No working.” _ Her grasp of Intsehli was just as atrocious as Ashivon’s grasp of Nital, Sanga’s language. Nevertheless, when things were important, the two of them insisted on using their horrible, broken versions of each other’s tongue.

Tselah, during these times, did his level best not to wince.

“Cut mark,” Ashivon argued, “Ashivon bleed big. Ashivon die.”

_ “No want,” _ said Sanga, and that was the end of that conversation. Besides, the small cuts from the bushes had scabbed over and Ashivon’s mark was no longer a problem.

For now.

* * *

Orin spotted the fugitive in a cold second. That dark hair peeking out of the Rusheleh fields stood out against the dun-coloured grain heads like a spot of blood on the snow. He could certainly feel frightened eyes watching him before he could see them. It wasn’t  _ usual _ to find people who had escaped the heavy-handed theocracy of the Church, but it was  _ prepared for. _ Everyone Orin knew on the roads had a story about someone finding one.

This one had to be standing on a row-meet, a stretch of raised soil so the farmers could tend and harvest the water-soaked crops without freezing their toes in the water. Those who managed to escape the Church were always short, always ragged, and always desperate and -uh oh- this one had a  _ family. _ There were three plumes of steam coming out of that field. Two who thought they needed to hide and one taking the risk of being the lookout.

_ The tired, the poor, the huddled masses… _ Orin let his horse follow the raised road as he dug into his cart for the emergency packs. Food and water for four days, all of stuff that travelled infinitely. Warm clothes. A map with symbols for the illiterate. Shoes… they always lacked shoes, for some reason. Poor things were always barefoot, blistered, and battle-scarred in the stories. Starving, sorrowed, and seeking any kind of respite. This one he could see was no different. Their clothes were filthy, and probably all they had.

One, two, three packs. Orin made certain the supplies were relatively fresh and they had a medical kit and some tools. Then he desperately attempted to remember the phrases he had learned from the traders who knew the language of the Church’s lands. What did they call it again? Nital? Yes. That sounded about right. They certainly didn’t speak Intsehli or Tha’roq, the other two trader tongues Orin had familiarity with.

He stopped the horse, put on the brakes, and made a show of waving and being friendly. “Hallo,  _ myssuz,” _ he hoped that was the right way to say it. The honorifics the Church had were numerous and confounding but this one - the traders said - was always good for any female, and this trembling example was definitely female. The males of the Chuch lands kept their hair cropped close to their heads. “I am good man, yes? I have these.” He gestured with a pack. “Three for family, all good. I put here, you take,  _ myssuz. _ I go, you take, is good. You no fear, yes?”

She was shaking like a wet dog, the poor creature, but there was a definite, trembling nod.

He had to add, “You follow sunset,  _ myssuz. _ Find good place. Friend place. Place like you, sunset way. Is good?”

Shiver, shake, pointing hand towards the west.

“Is good,  _ myssuz.” _ Orin put one pack down, carefully, so as to not make a noise too loud for their terrors. “Is all good.” The second one down, and the Rusheleh moved, just a little. The poor frantic lookout ducked below the screen of the crop, but popped back up again. Just in time to watch Orin put the third pack down. “I go now,  _ myssuz. _ I wish good fortunes, yes? You is be good.” He did not race off, but let the horse amble along as he had ambled before.

He did not look back. Fugitive folks from the Church lands did not trust easily, and they did not trust well. Orin had done what he could, and now it was up to them. Trust or not trust.

He  _ wanted _ to look back. To glance behind and be certain the trio of lost souls in the wet fields had what they needed. Orin knew better, despite the worry in his heart about the little family. If he even  _ twitched _ towards looking back, they would be off like a shot with the nothing they already had. Orin couldn’t have that on his conscience, so he kept his gaze fixed on his horse’s ears and the road ahead of him.

_ Ancestors keep them all safe. Keep them all well. See them to a place where they will know only the smallest fears, _ he prayed. He would not pray to the Church’s gods. Not now, not ever. Those deities had already betrayed their followers.

He would be back along this road in three days. If the packs were gone, then he could hope that the little family was safely away. He would never see them, he would never know their names and they would never know his. He would receive no thanks, not in person, for his deeds this day.

All he had was a story.  _ Three of them, poor things, huddled up in the Rusheleh, and two of them fearing to show their faces. All of them too scared to make a sound, shivering in the wet. I knew them for Church folk all the same. There’s a look to that kind, like everyone says, and what I saw of the mother, she had that look… _ A story for his family and friends, and any traders he might meet. A story for anyone who wanted to know about the lost and the wandering. A story like all the others.

_ I never saw them, mind, by my friend saw one… _ or,  _ It happened to my Auntie, they were halfway starved mad… _ and,  _ Two of them, barely skin and bones, could hardly hold their heads up, but they were ready to run with everything they had left. _

Once in a great long while, there were long chains of them. Clusters of families, little groups that grouped together. Fleeing into the unknown because the evil they knew was a far, far greater threat. Never staying for long, never saying much if they said anything at all. Yet they all had that look. Haunted eyes. The way they looked around as if expecting an attack from any angle. Like a whipped dog, afraid of anyone who came too close.

Broken people, with just enough sense to escape being destroyed for good.

Orin sincerely wished them the best. They deserved it, after all… they had already been through the worst.


	4. Chapter 4

They scooped up the packs and ran across the raised soil lines, as far away from the road as they could manage. The pilfered grain in these soaking fields just wasn’t worth it, no matter how surprisingly delicious a porridge they made. There was a temple sort of inside one of the hills on the other side of the field. The trio ducked inside its dark confines and caught their breaths. Straining to hear any signs of pursuit.

What Sanga heard was Ashivon hissing in pain. His feet were cramping, by the looks of things. Cold water and hard earth and lots of running and hiding and stress, all ganging up on him. She couldn’t heal his injuries, but she could see to his hurts.

Sanga avoided the command words from the trainers. Ashivon didn’t need any help at all remembering those pains. Therefore, she said,  _ “Come rest?” _ and demonstrated a completely seated position rather than Ashivon’s usual crouch. She gently teased a foot out from under him and warmed the cramping toes with her hands and her breath, easing the knotted muscle with careful strokes of her fingers.

Poor Ashivon. All the thicker, dark hair of his shoulders and back had flared up. Even the hair on his head had fluffed up. She didn’t have the words for him. “I know. This is more than you’re used to.”  _ More than he’d ever received since he came to the Church… _ She kept working as Tselah translated. “I took a vow and I meant it. ‘Where there is wounding, I will heal.’ I can’t use the light, any more, but I know other ways to heal…” Sanga blew hot breath onto his cramping foot, and worked her way up to his odd, backwards knee. She reveled in that expression of confounded relief.

Ashivon’s face was an open book, and that goofy expression meant that he was loving every instant of what she was doing for him. It used to be so rare to see him enjoying a moment, so now Sanga revelled in that expression. She could soak up the aura of his joy for the rest of her life and never be satisfied. He deserved a lifetime of joy and more.

Ashivon pressed his other foot into her leg as if to say,  _ I do have two feet and this one is getting lonely… _

Sanga laughed and, satisfied that one foot was well, tended to the other. She had once been terrified of his eyes and the light within them. Now? A night without their warm glow was a night of fear.

Tselah was going through one of the packs in the methodical way that children everywhere went through everything. Taking it all out and seeing what each and every thing inside was. He spoke in both Intsehli and Nital, naming each object as best he could. “Map. _Map,”_ he said, laying the paper down. “Lodestone-needle. _Compass…_ Waterskin. _Canteen-sack._ _Blanket? No. Cloak!_ Cover!”

Sanga looked. The thing Tselah was playing with did look like a blanket, but it had a hole in the middle for a wearer’s head. Tselah had his head through it, and the rest around him like a tent. The kind traveller likely expected that one to be for adults, but there would be no getting it off Tselah now.

She couldn’t help giggling as Tselah picked up the front of his blanket-garment and made show of parading around in it like a highborn. The affect must be a parody of highborn Intseh, which neither she nor Ashivon could understand. Nevertheless, Tselah thought himself hilarious and dropped the act in favour of laughing. Somehow, he got himself tangled up in his own trailing edges and wound up in a heap of a cocoon on the floor.

Sanga and Ashivon both flinched to catch him before he could hurt himself, but the little boy managed to arrest his own fall.

“Tselah good,” he chirped in both languages. “You go kiss.”

Sanga looked back to Ashivon, face colouring. They had been indulging that want for each other rather more than regularly.

Ashivon flexed his foot in her hands. “Kiss good,” he said with more than a smirk. “Touch good. Sanga… much good.”

Well, his  _ foot _ was cured.

She couldn’t say the same about his attitude. Not that she minded so much. Or at all, come to think of it. Sanga let his foot go and moved to his side.  _ “Touch much good,” _ she agreed.

A swoop of cover enveloped them and, after a moment’s confusion, light came again with three heads poking through the hole in the cover. Their little matchmaker squirmed back out again and went looking through more of the packs.

Sanga took the hint and snuggled up to Ashivon, who yelped as her body leaned into his. Her hands might be warm, but the rest of her had chilled right down. Ashivon, as always, was a living furnace. Fine, trained muscle wrapped in velvet. He was a delight to experience.

He was even more of a delight now that he was no longer feeding on Human flesh. That carrion scent was gone from him. Sanga lingered in the kiss, feeling herself thaw from the skin inwards. Smoothing her hands over his body as his strong arms wrapped around her.

The cuts from their escape, where the light had restrained him, had healed over. The scabs were gone, now, but his fur had yet to grow back over the marks. Her fingers found them unnervingly smooth, like the glossy mark from a burn.

Sanga could not wish that those marks weren’t there. If he hadn’t fought, they’d both be dead now, and poor little Tselah would be undergoing the worst tortures as her own people would be teaching him how to be angry, how to strike out… how to eat the raw flesh of the condemned.

Ashivon’s hand, large and slightly leathery, found her scar. One finger delicately tracing the straight line made by that ass Drid’l’s knife.

She might wish  _ that _ scar didn’t exist. She could briefly dream of a world in which she was faster about striking at least  _ one _ of Ashivon’s handlers. She could free him and he would have easily taken down Drid’l and…

...and they would have died, eventually. The forces of the Church were too numerous. It was a miracle they got out with Tselah.

_ Tselah! _

In Sanga’s imagined change of fate, would they have had the chance to rescue that innocent life? Or would they have tried to flee with just each other?

It did not do to pursue games with fate. Sanga had never imagined this moment before it happened and, now that it had, wouldn’t change any of it. She could wish she could still summon the light and the song, but would she pay for it with Tselah’s captivity? Never. She could wish that Ashivon had never been scarred, but that was not worth their lives.

The sound of chewing invaded her senses, and Sanga reluctantly broke the kiss to check on the child, who had found some food supplies and was nibbling on them as he watched them.

Cheeky little scamp.

She refused to act like the Church insisted, refused to punish Tselah for being hungry. It was a fight, even if it was a fight of a moment.  _ “Good food?” _ she tried in Intsehli.

Tselah hadn’t caught Sanga’s brief ire. He nodded as he chewed. “Tasty. Hard.”

“Hungry,” added Ashivon. His arm came out of their shared blanket-cloak to reach for some.  _ “Please? I’m so hungry.” _

_ “You’re always hungry,” _ complained Tselah, but he shared what he had.

Sanga tried a bite. It was… tough to chew, but the flavours… One day, she would want to make something like this. It wasn’t at all like the bland gruel or the thin stews of the Church kitchens. It certainly put what passed for her cooking to shame. Sanga only knew of salt -for the Saint’s tears- and Rosemary -to remember- to add to her cooking and she’d been unable to find either on her trek. Even as she hummed her appreciation, she felt ashamed that she couldn’t reproduce what she appreciated.

_ If we find their own kind, and I hope we do, _ Sanga thought, _ the first Intseh woman with a knowledge of cookery is going to snatch him away from me. _

He’d be happy, she knew, with his own kind. He’d belong, and nobody would have a need to hurt him or make him suffer. Sanga would pay for that with her own loneliness. It wasn’t as if she ever planned on bearing any bastards anyway. Why bother missing what she never wanted?

But it still ached to think of being alone in a place with no place for her.

Sanga finished her portion of… whatever it was, and clung tight to Ashivon.Treasuring the feel of him, committing his scent to memory. Sooner or later, they would be westward enough to find a place of peace. Sooner or later, this closeness would be lost to her.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Offensensitivity warning for semi-raunchy dream and subconscious weirdness in the second half of this chapter

The packs had useful things. Warm, sort of cloak things that were more like blankets with holes in them for a head. One each of those went a long way towards keeping warm in the chilly weather. Ashivon and Tselah were less bothered by the chill, but poor Sanga… she never had a coat of fur to keep herself warm, and she suffered in the cold.

Each of the packs held something interesting to Sanga. She called them  _ Allboots _ and the were, more or less, leather sacks with a thicker plate of leather on what had to be the bottom. She demonstrated how to use the ties to make them fit any foot, and wrapped up both his and Tselah’s feet in the things.

“No more cramped toes,” Tselah translated. “No more wet fur.”

Ashivon had rather liked the warming massage Sanga had given him, but she might not have liked doing it, so he kept quiet on the matter.

There was also the compasses. One per pack. The red-painted needle always pointed to the frozen lands in the north, Tselah said, so west was on the left side of that needle. Always have the red pointing to the right, and they would be headed west.

Towards hope. Towards safety. Towards friendlier people.

They would be Humans, and they would tolerate Ashivon and Tselah for Sanga’s sake. They would be kind, he knew it. Sanga was sure to find a kind Human who would love her for the warrior woman she was, and she would be happy.

He and Tselah would be their own little family. Never truly alone, but never belonging.

Ashivon decided that, if Sanga was happy, he could tolerate anything. Even if that anything included the rest of his life without her touch.

Whenever she came close to him, leaned on him or wrapped herself around him, Ashivon savoured her touch. Forever gentle, he would gather her up close to him and fill his lungs with her scent. Every kiss was a prize he felt was unfairly won, but he would not trade them for anything.

She would be better off with someone she could talk to… without needing a translator.

He tried to learn Nital, but he just couldn’t get it all into his head. He spoke her words worse than any infant might. She, he knew, tried just as hard to learn Intsehli. It took work to communicate anything.

Sooner rather than later, she wouldn’t need him to keep her warm. Sooner rather than later, she would have better company.

For now, he enjoyed the touch of her hand. For now, he delighted in the nights when they clung together for warmth. For now, every meal together was a joy. The walked ever westward, bolstering the supplies in their packs with whatever forage they could find.

Up through the mountains. Around the towns they feared and winding along by the rivers. Always hiding at the slightest hint that someone might see them. Always veering away from the sign of the Church whenever they saw it.

The mountain pass had to be the worst of it. Biting cold and thin rations - Tselah ate first, and Ashivon did his utmost to eat as little as possible. Doing everything they could to avoid being seen. Covering up as much as they could…

Tselah felt the cold more intensely, and Ashivon became used to carrying the child in the safety of his cover-cloak, with his head in a hat that could easily cover all that poked out at the neckline.

Sanga suffered the pass, the higher they went, the weaker she got. Gasping for air and trembling with effort as well as the cold. She had no fur to protect her and extra layers could only do so much.

He carried her, too. Tselah, Sanga, and everything they owned. On and on through the cold. On and on, until the path finally turned downwards, and the promise of warmth lay in the distant greenlands below.

It was a treacherous path, all the same. Walked mostly by insolent goats that saw no threat in his presence. They were right to make that assumption. There was no way he could hunt them  _ and _ carry everyone he loved at the same time that he picked his way towards more reliable ground.

“Put Sanga down,” she said in Intsehli. “Much hot.”

Ashivon first had to find a place where her larger feet would fit.  _ “Bad ground,” _ he said in Nital.

“Much hot,” she complained again.

Tselah was riding his shoulders, and Sanga was under the cover-cloak. It was some precarious juggling, but he got her out into the open air. Her skin was turning pinker, and she looked…  _ She looked like she had looked after she’d been sick. Worn out and struggling and slick with sweat and… _

_ “Sanga sick?” _

“...hot…” she complained.

Ashivon worked harder to get down to safety. This way, that way, down and down. Towards the trees and the shelter they offered. Towards running water, where he could help her be cool and gather together the things that would make her better. Towards a place they could hide and hope and -if there were any gods who would listen to the likes of Ashivon- to pray.

Tselah was the most help, showing Ashivon some remedial plants that Sanga had taught him, and some he remembered from his own homelands. Exactly how to turn them into medicine wasn’t knowledge to him, just how to render them safe to eat.

So they cooked them all up into one big stew and hoped for the best.

* * *

The last few days had been a patchwork of snow and assorted curses as they made their way through the mountains. After that… things got foggy.

Sanga remembered… Ashivon. Warm and strong and carrying her. The way she clung to him, and his scent… She remembered… the scraping of rocks and claws and things being too hot.

She wanted to walk. It wasn’t far to the library. She remembered the stone… and saw an endless collonade in the summer sun.

_ It had been winter, yesterday… _

Ash was walking with her in the heat. Tall and proud and safe and whole and dressed…  _ like a rich merchant in finely-patterned brocade and there were flowers in his hair and hers… _

She was dressed as a bride, not as a nun. All embroidery and layers of fine silk, no wonder she was feeling the heat, she was used to ordinary hemp.

The temple and the wedding were a blur, as was the feast, and before they knew it, she was with him in the bedchamber. An Archdeacon’s bedchamber, all gold and velvet and fine linen and silks…

Sanga wasn’t certain how she got undressed, but the size of him compared with her had never been so intimidating.  _ They were going to...oh no! _

She had learned all she could learn about medicine, she had helped with numerous births and even a sanctioned abortion or two. What she had not studied was…

_ They were going to consummate… _

Ashivon was careful, as he always was. Holding her gently as he eased her naked body onto their wedding bed. His kisses always made her delirious, and this was no different, but now she could feel the living velvet of his naked body against hers and she daren’t look at his privates and…

She expected pain.

They said it hurt, the first time.

_ They lied about that, too. _

He never crushed her, and the tingling joy she felt in her own privates became a rush exactly like the light and the song that flooded her through…

He was holding her in his arms and this wasn’t a bedchamber, it was a cave. The cave where they’d cut through to escape the Church, but it was a home, now, and her belly was round and  _ moving _ and Ashivon was trying to get her to eat that horrible ‘stew’ they made him eat when he was in that awful cage.

“Eat?” he begged. “Sanga need…”

It tasted awful. She gagged. “Where’s Tselah?”

“Eat.”

Now it was her in the cage and other Intseh outside of it and the pot of meat was raw and rank and…

“Ashivon? Where is--”

The light burned when it hit her. She lashed out with claws and teeth…

At Ashivon, frightened and standing alone in the arena with her. A quarter of her size and armed only with a rock…

_ Eat… _

NO!

Burning ropes, holding her down. Yelling. A baby. An axe.

_ No, but they’d run away… _

They were in a forest and it was hot. Ashivon was holding her and Tselah had something in a spoon. “Eat?” he said. “You need to eat.”

They… they weren’t anywhere she knew. The boys were safe. She wasn’t a monster. She wasn’t pregnant. The stew… was awful. What had they done? Thrown everything in a pot together and hoped it would work?

Wet rags trickled cold water over her head. Into her mouth. Over her shoulders and down…

He had taken most of her clothes off!

By the Saint’s mercy, she was almost naked! Laying there in his arms in nothing but her breast bags and drawers!

Sanga wanted to snatch up a cloth, a garment, anything, and cover her sins, but her first attempt was like moving underwater with a vicious cramp.

“Sanga safe,” said Ashivon. “Sanga sick, hot. Ashivon make cool. Ashivon make good.”

“You need to eat,” said Tselah.

At least it was quenching, that stew. Cooked until everything just melted into mush in her mouth. Which might have been a mercy, since that allowed her to swallow it all the quicker. It was not, unfortunately, very filling.

“Did either of you taste this?” she asked. She had half a mind to struggle, but she knew she was weaker than a day-old pup. Sanga resigned herself to eating her fill of this horrible had-to-be-medicinal stew.

She understood more Intsehli than she could say and, though the rounds of we-can’t-taste-it, it’s-for-her, we-should-have were amusing in their way, it was not an argument she could tolerate in her current condition. “Please…” she said.

“Ashivon eat, Ashivon eat all,” he said.

“It’s medicine,” argued Tselah. “You don’t eat medicine unless you’re sick.”

By the gods and the Saint, she loved them both, but now? Right at this moment? She could easily attempt to throttle them. Sanga rested her eyes and sighed, “Any fool can make medicine, it takes a seasoned professional to make medicine the patient will  _ want _ to take.” That much argument took the last of the fight out of her, for the day, and she sank against the pillow of Ashivon’s muscles with a grateful sigh.

She thanked any deities around that this time, she did not dream.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content warning for blood mention and fish slaughter

The furless - Humans - were lumpy in odd places. Especially their females. Ashivon could only vaguely recall what his mother looked like, but she did  _ not _ look like Sanga. He knew she was back to herself when she covered up her squishy chest lumps with both arms. She was sensitive about letting anyone see them, he knew. She had also been feverish and needed to cool down, so he had gone as far as he dared without leaving them completely bare.

How did they  _ work, _ these furless? Sanga was so thin in the middle, compared to the rest of her, that he wondered if she could snap.

Ashivon was even more careful with her than usual, as he tended to her illness. She seemed so much smaller, once she was still and weak and helpless.

On the other hand, he had never been happier to have her back. Returning to normal and taking on life with her usual fierce determination. When she struggled to get back to her usual self, confounding clothing and all, that was when he knew she was going to be fine.

She was still weak, and he worried. He tried Nital.  _ “Sanga want help?” _

Sanga’s face turned red. Not the red of her fever, but a different red. She smelled… angry? Not angry. Something close to angry.

She’d never been angry with him.

_ “Ashivon… bad?” _

Sanga took a deep breath and let it out. “Ashivon no bad,” she insisted. She pulled on her clothes, quickly. She seemed… shamed? “Ashivon…  _ Tselah, help me say the right words. How do I tell him I’m not allowed to be this naked around a man?” _

Tselah fluffed up in shock.  _ “I don’t know how to say it either. This is not our way.” _

“What is she saying? What did I do wrong?”

“It’s something… furless,” said Tselah.  _ “Your body is shame?” _

_ “Our bodies are sinful. We keep them covered so that none can sin. These…” _ she touched her lumpy chest.  _ “Drive men to sin. They’re meant to be for babies only, but if a man sees them…” _ She wrapped herself up, in both clothing and in her arms.  _ “I’ve seen too many women who got hurt because they made a wrong step.” _

Tselah translated, “Sanga says her chest lumps make furless males do bad things, so she has to cover them up.”

Oh! Oh no… Ashivon knelt on the ground and put his hands behind his back, like he would for the bonds when  _ they _ wanted to take him anywhere.  _ “Ashivon no hurt Sanga,” _ he insisted. He could stay like this as long as he liked. He was used to staying like that for long, long times.  _ They _ had made sure he knew how to do it.

Sanga’s reaction was sorrowful tears.  _ “No, no, no, no, no… No don’t…” _ Dressed now, she rushed to his side and put her arms around him.  _ “Don’t do that. No.” _ He hands smoothed his fur and coaxed his arms out from behind him.  _ “I’m sorry, I’m sorry. I should have known you’re not like them. You’re not them, I’m sorry…” _

He held her, as carefully as he had held her when she was sick. For all that he desperately wanted to hold her tight, that was not the way. She had just been frightened. _ He had frightened her. _ She was nervous. _ He had unnerved her. _ The absolute worst thing to do to her at this moment was cling like a desperate child.

It took some translating, and a lot of understanding. Ashivon couldn’t fit his mind around the fact that furless female’s chests had that much power over the males. Women who used them to feed their babies (how? Sanga went red and stammered so much that he let the question go) had to go to private rooms so their babies could eat. Those rooms weren’t everywhere, and many were forced into privies when the babies needed them.

Tselah had a baby sister, and he knew that babies could eat at least mush and bite their big brothers tail from the moment they came into the world. He tried to explain that Intseh babies had teeth, and Sanga wrapped her chest up in her arms again. Ashivon couldn’t understand why, but he could scent her fear.

_ “Save me from Intseh babies,” _ murmured Sanga. She recovered her usual mood quickly, though. First making sure that Ashivon knew everything was back to what passed for normal amongst them. Starting with something he and Tselah had missed - cooking lessons.

The improved dinner included catfish they caught together with the simple lure of the rejected medicinal stew. These ones were fatted monsters, snatched with claw and quick reflexes from what they thought was a feast. It was worth getting his pants soaked to snatch them out of the water and watch Sanga and Tselah catch them out of the air. It was Sanga, who counted meat as murder, who knew the quickest and cleanest way to slaughter a fish. Four quick moves and a careful use of a long, thin splinter… and from there into a container of water where the last of its blood finished draining.

They had a small mountain of fish, that then had to be gutted and finally prepared for the pot. Sanga’s instructions, translated through Tselah, told Ashivon all he never wanted to know about preparing meat. She had had a great many onerous tasks with the Church that had ruled her life. One such had been assisting with the fish that the higher-ups insisted on for a feast of some import. She was not rewarded, she said, for how many fish she processed… but rather beaten whenever she was too slow. Or again if she missed a step.

Ashivon was more glad than ever that they were away from that place.

The fish soup smelled better than their medicine stew and once they had their fill, Ashivon settled in their nest with one arm around each of the people dearest to him.

That was the first night that Sanga’s hand trailed down from his shoulder, and traced delicate patterns across the rest of his exposed chest. Tracing the grain of his fur, the line of his muscles, the occasional traces of his bones, underneath. He could live with touches like that for the rest of his life and never grow tired of them.

* * *

Tselah climbed out onto the tallest branch with the confidence of a child who knew that he had two hyper-anxious adults waiting underneath, ready to catch him if he fell. He had the best eyes and the lightest body, a combination that had him up in tall places and looking into settlements to see a symbol like Sanga’s, but without the cut.

If there was one such symbol anywhere in sight in the distant town, there would be another week of skulking through the outskirts, hiding from any waking soul, and stealing whatever they could to eat until they were safely away. Which was horrible, in a way, because there were  _ people, _ right  _ there, _ but they weren’t safe people so the three of them had to hide. The people with that mark were dangerous and bad. They had hurt Ashivon. They had hurt Sanga.

As he peered out over the town, he wished that there would be no marks, that he would see some Intseh wandering around in the early light. That  _ this _ time, they would be friendly. He was tired of sleeping in the open or inside of improvised shelters or huddling in ruins. All the novelty had gone out of eating whatever they could find, cooked in cauldron or on the end of a stick over what fire they could make. Though he desperately wanted to go home and be re-united with his mothers, he also craved a roof over his head and a warm fireside and an actual bed and a hot bath and… well… all the comforts of home.

Wishes, unfortunately, don’t always come true.

There were three buildings with the symbol on them. Tselah groaned to himself and clambered back down. Another two weeks of sneaking around, thievery, and hiding in unpleasant circumstances. Again.

Sanga saw his face on his way down and, though Ashivon was the first to reach him, was eager to comfort him. “Bad news,” she said.

“Bad news,” he sighed.

They held each other, hiding in the shadows of the woods. More than a few tears were shed. They, too, were tired of travelling west with little in the way of hope. Somewhere west… there was a place that was friendly to Intseh.

When they got there, would they be friendly to Humans?

Tselah worried about that a lot. He daydreamed about meeting his mothers, somewhere on their seemingly perpetual journey. Of course they would rush up and cover him in kisses and groom him and love him and cry because they had been so worried… They would even scoop Ashivon into their home and feed him all he could eat and care for his hurts, but… Sanga?

He couldn’t imagine much more than a chilled and reserved welcome for someone as unusual as Sanga.

He’d never seen anyone like her before the light took him away from his home, so his mothers might be wary. Especially once he started to explain the bad symbol and the people who used the hurting magic. Ashivon had spent most of his whole life in a cage. He knew nothing of the outside world (though he was learning fast) and less than nothing of Intseh ways. There were nights when he twitched and mumbled, snarling, at the horrors he’d survived (always calmed by Sanga’s soothing voice and gentle touch) and days when he was wont to jump at any sudden shadow.

Sanga was hardly any better. She hid it well, but she was jumpy at best, constantly terrified of things that made no sense at all to Tselah. There hadn’t been a single day when she didn’t reek of fear. Even when she was in the depths of her illness, she was afraid.

They both cared for him, he knew, but… they were both broken people, hardly able to keep themselves in balance. They needed help Tselah couldn’t provide…

They needed help, but the help they needed lay somewhere to the west. Past this town. Further and further on.

When would it be over? When would they be safe? When would they find what they needed? When could they finally  _ rest? _

Tselah didn’t know.

All he was certain of was another two weeks of fear, hiding, and covert meals. Two weeks of tension, and nightmares, and watching anyone who came near for any sign that they were going to be dangerous.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sanga used a technique called Ikejime to kill her fish, slightly adjusted for available technology. Not for the squeamish if you want to look that up. Interestingly, it also helps the fish meat last longer and taste better in the long run. It’s all about panic chemicals and the benefits of preventing a slow and laborious death for your food.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Many apologies for any missed days. My schedule has been a little whack of late. There is more, I haven't forgotten this fic.

Hralevon saw them lurking in the woods at the edge of her fields. Caught the heavy scent of fear. Exiles, most likely. People looking for a new start. She could see one pair of eyes in the shadows, but they were so low and so far away that she couldn’t tell if they were young or old. All she knew was that there was more than one.

It was a bad story, for sure, but the Divine preached mercy, even for the wicked. They could be redeemed with kindness and education. Well, most of them could. The poor things deserved a chance, anyway.

Therefore, Hralevon turned away from her fields and headed back to her house. Let’s see… bread for certain. Smoked and dried meats. The dessicated mushrooms. A pot of honey… that was always welcome. Salt… everyone needed salt. Some voluminous clothing that would fit where it touched if they were lucky… Blankets… they were always wanting blankets. Lastly, of course, a basket to carry it all in.

By the time she was done fussing around with the basket, the fugitives were running as fast as they could westward. A big male carrying two smaller figures. Too far away to hear what they might be saying. Hralevon knew that calling after them would only make them run faster, the poor things, and they were already too far away for her to catch them.

What had spooked this lost little family? All that was out here was her, her fields, her chickens, and her laundry. Hralevon put the basket away, by her door in case of the next set of ragged exiles, or in the slim chance that this little family might circle back in desperation.

Well. The weeding was done enough… Hralevon went out to the line to see how dry her laundry was, as the chickens cooed and pecked at the ground. Her smalls were dry, but the vestments and tabard, with their bold symbol of the Divine, would have to wait an hour or two.

She looked out to the west, where the little family was no more than a speck in the distance.  _ Divinity watch over you and keep you safe. May you find welcome in your next stop. May you find security. May you find peace. _

She wished she could have done more, but there was nothing a wish could do at this stage in the game. She could, however, tell her people and thereby spread the word. There were other towns to the west. Other towns who could find them and help them in the name of the Divine. There were some, she knew, who would reject exiles out of hand. Their reasoning was impeccable - whatever they had done to warrant exile, they could do again. That reasoning just didn’t mesh with Hralevon’s Divine teachings.

There were other things to do, today. Her vestments would be dry by the time she was done seeing to her followers. There were families who needed medicine, families who needed assistance in one thing or another. Little bits of help that only needed two more hands.

How fortunate for them, then, that she had those, and the hours, to spare.

* * *

_ I must be going mad, I must have gone mad, _ Ashivon thought. His strength hadn’t failed him, but his ability to run had. He’d carried those he loved as far and as fast as he could, but he could go no further, now. His legs shook from the effort. The rest of him shook from the fear.

He’d  _ sworn _ he scented a fellow Intseh… but then Tselah pointed out the symbol on the cloth on the rope, flapping like a flag in the light wind.

Sanga’s symbol.

The symbol of those who had hurt him, hurt her, who had left thousands in the arena to fight him and die. The symbol of captivity, pain, humiliation, and fear.

So he’d grabbed Sanga and Tselah and run like the multitude of furless were after him with every weapon he had ever seen. Run like he was in a nightmare. Run until he could run no more, and fell into a tangle of bushes.

Sanga moved to hold him and he clutched at her in the same desperation that landed them in this situation in the first place. For a moment, just a moment, he was alone with her in those fearsome stone halls, unable to say something as simple as,  _ I will not hurt a child. _

For a moment, just a moment, he feared the burning of the restraining whips, he feared being right back at the beginning again.

_ “No eat child… No hurt… No… no….” _

Sanga hummed a gentle tune in his ear, something she had not done in that dread hallway. Held him tight and ran her hands along his fur. “Sshh… Ssh-ssh-ssh… Ashivon no hurt,” she murmured in Intsehli. “Ashivon safe. Breathe… breathe…” She put a little voice to her breaths, exaggerating her own breathing, helping him match her.

The baby - no, Tselah… Tselah touched his face, where the tears had fallen. “You were scared?” he said.

The proper words still escaped him. “Bad place. Ashivon in… bad place… again.”

“Look,” said Sanga. “See. See Sanga? See Tselah?”

He could nod. “See… Plants. Sky. Clouds…”

“Good. Hear.” Sanga had had bad times like this, too. She had counted down the senses like this. Now she was helping him in the same way.

“Hear… birds. I hear water, and… wind… I hear a frog…” It was working. The ghosts of the bad place were fading away.

“Good. Touch…”

He reached out to feel the silky softness of Sanga’s hair, and the warmth of her skin. Something forbidden when he was in a cage. “I feel Sanga… the ground… and… the wind.” His breaths became slower. His heart stopped trying to escape his ribs. They were… all right… for want of a better description. They were safe. Safe enough. For now. He sniffed. “I smell a river… and chickens.” He leaned in to kiss her. “Good taste. Best taste.”

Sanga laughed and her cheeks turned pink. “Better,” she said, and, “That close.”

_ “Much close. Frighten close,” _ he added in Nital. Ashivon could not let her go, could not loosen his grip on her. Not yet. He needed her close to him. He needed the reassurance of the feel of her body against his. Hers, and Tselah’s. Feeling them there. Holding them close. Knowing that they were safe… and therefore all was well. The sun had moved by the time he felt well enough to let his little family loose. Hours had been wasted in panic. Hours where the Church could well have tracked them down.

They needed to move quickly. They needed to move cautiously. They needed to  _ move, _ regardless of how they did it. Tselah sensed his agitation and peeked out from among the bushes. Back the way they had come, out to either side of the direction in which they planned to go, and finally westward. “Nobody,” he said.

All the same, they kept low to the ground, not daring to show themselves above the local plantlife. Ashivon crept along, close to the ground. Terrified of having his horns give them away. It was a tense handful of hours, finishing in the shelter of another stand of trees. Huddling together in breathless trepidation. Straining their ears for the slightest hint of pursuit.

Sleep didn’t come easily that night. They were lucky it came at all.


	8. Chapter 8

The fur had grown back over Ashivon’s scars, but it had grown back white. Whenever he stripped down -say- to bathe in some opportune water, the marks showed where the Church had bound him. A lingering souvenir of his last days as their trained murderer. Sanga knew from personal experience that the white fur felt no different to the rest of it, but seeing those criss-cross lines of long-past pain hurt her heart more than a little.

Sanga thought of it as a silent rebuke. If she hadn't succumbed to the temptation to hold a being in pain… Tselah would still be at home with his family. She would still have her powers.  _ Ashivon would still be a captive monster, murdering for the Church… _ That one evil outweighed the other good. Nevertheless, she should have been smarter. She should have thought of another way. She should have…

Sanga realised that Ashivon was emerging from his bath, and turned away before she saw something she shouldn't. Tempting though it was to learn a fragment more about Intseh anatomy, neither he nor she knew what was appropriate for his kind. Tselah was their only guide, and he was a child. What his parents were allowed to see was not for the viewing of strangers. Therefore, Sanga erred on the side of prudish caution.

She was glad that Ashivon and Tselah respected her own need for privacy, turning away from her when she needed to bathe. It was good to be clean, and there were days when she truly needed the cleansing power of water.

Today was not one of those days. The air and the water were chill. She stayed in it only as long as it took to chase the grime from her, and rushed to get back into her clothing.

They had planned this leg of the trip to be over another set of peaks and below the snowline again before sunset. They could do it, but the path on the other side was unknown. A risk. Just like all the other risks they had taken to get this far.

Ashivon handed her a mature cattail pod and some strips of cloth. "Blood soon," he said. He had never been wrong yet. He could smell it on her before she got the first twinge, Tselah said. Sanga added the belt to her clothing routine, stuffed with soft, absorbent fluff.

Everything ready to go, they began the climb. Light little Tselah springing from ledge to ledge like a little goatling, Ashivon leaping after with catlike grace… and Sanga plodding along, testing each handhold and foothold, dragging herself and her pack uphill with only the memory of where her Intseh had leaped to guide her.

She would catch them up and even overtake them in the long run. They would leap ahead, yes, but they would also need frequent breaks to catch their wind. Intseh were made for dashing, not relentless pursuit. They’d all learned this on the occasions that they hunted together. Ashivon could sneak from upwind and leap onto a beast, killing it from shock and blood loss. Sanga wore them down. One spear to wound them and, after miles of following it, one spear to end its life when she had endlessly jogged along on its trail.

Walking was the only mode of self-transportation where they were on -ha- an even footing. They both could walk, and had walked, for miles.

Sanga passed them a second time, catching Tselah as a passenger, when she saw the winding path through the low part of the jagged peaks. Ashivon, out of breath and forced to walk, groaned as she started to trot. She turned long enough to grin at him, pointing at the far end of the path.  _ “Hope there,” _ she said in Intsehli.  _ “Sanga wait in hope.” _

Tselah whooped for joy as she jogged, listening to his voice echo against the rocks. It was easy to be happy about crossing mountains, even low mountains like these ones. One more set of mountains was another barrier to the Church finding them.

Sanga slowed as the path changed from solid stone to slate-like scree. She could see low clouds lapping at the mountains, the beginnings of a long and winding valley below. The setting sun turned them into an ocean of gold. It was easy to wish that this time, they would find somewhere friendly.  _ This _ time, it would be somewhere safe. That maybe, just maybe, there would be shelter and help and somewhere to belong.

It was easy to wish and hope. Easy to daydream. Harder to discover the truth and keep persisting in their rough journey.

Sanga didn't pray, not any more. The Church had drained all the faith out of her, but this time, slowing to a cautious walk over the loose scree, she begged for fortune from the universe.  _ Please, please… let this place be good… _

She slowed down even further as more of the valley revealed itself below her. Was it clouds or mist? Was it safe enough, or was there danger lurking beneath those golden clouds? How far down did they have to go before they saw or were seen? Were those clouds really thick enough to obscure them or was the sun deceiving them into thinking they were hidden?

The wind lapped the clouds against their perch and the world below peeked through. Farmlands, yes, but the buildings scattered below were not buildings that Sanga was familiar with. That gave her a glimmer of hope.

Tselah hopped down, slipping slightly on the scree. Sanga automatically reached out to secure him by the arm. “Devan-Intseh,” he said, tears forming in his luminous eyes. “Devan-Intseh!”

It took her a moment to realise he was saying,  _ “Our place. Our place!” _ in Intsehli.

Ashivon joined her side, staring in disbelief at the little buildings far below.  _ “...our place,” _ he whispered.

Two Intseh had to be safe here. Sanga had her doubts about her fate, but nevertheless used the revelation as a great excuse to hug and kiss Ashivon and Tselah both. She’d done it! They’d done it! They’d found a place of safety! At last!

Breathless and giggly, she said,  _ “Now walking down, yes? Much careful.” _ She let go of Tselah and Ashivon both, and took one step back. One step she would regret, perhaps for the rest of her life.

_ She would never forget the look on Ashivon’s face as her feet slid, and she began to slip away from him. Her nightmares would forever measure the fractions of an inch by which their hands missed each other. Then there was little but a confusing slide of stones and collisions and increasing terror and pain… _

Sanga did not remember the blow that knocked her unconscious. In retrospect, considering the injuries she sustained reaching the valley, that might have been a good thing.


	9. Chapter 9

It was one of those moments when time slowed down so he could appreciate just how badly things were going at that particular second. He could see every thinly-sliced instant of her fall, from her initial alarm at her misstep, through her missed grab for his outstretched arms, to the dawning terror that this would not easily stop.

And then she was gone.

Time resumed its normal flow, just in time for him to watch her slide down the flakes of stone, bouncing off some that were in her path.

There was no choice. He leaped after her, calling her name so loudly that it echoed in the valley below. Ashivon didn't know any gods, and had never prayed for mercy. He'd never expected it from the furless and found it miraculous in Sanga… but now he begged fate,  _ Please let her live, she is my everything… _

He tried to catch her, to slow her inexorable slide ever downwards.

For the first time in his life, he was too slow. For the first time in his life, his reflexes and training failed him. For the first time in his life, he failed  _ her. _

She was limp when she spun out of his reach for the last time. She was bent all wrong when she finally came to a halt. Worse, she was bleeding.

The instant he smelled it, the mark on his arm pulsed. The hunger and anger rose in him and he fought it as hard as he could.

He could not - would not - listen to that mark with Sanga. She needed help, not the overwhelming influence of the Church. Hunger gnawed at him, even as he forced himself upwind.  _ “No, no, no,” _ he told himself in Nital.  _ “No eat Sanga… No hurt Sanga… No…. no…” _

* * *

Sanga lay frighteningly still at the bottom of the slope. Ashivon had gone after her without thinking. Of course he did. They had something special together, even though they couldn’t always understand their words, they understood what they had. Tselah was far more careful about picking his way down to where Sanga lay.

Still.

Far, far too still.

Her arms and legs were bent in ways they never should have gone, and blood was coming out of her. It looked like way too much blood.

Ashivon wasn’t good about this. He was lost, Tselah thought, looking at Sanga. When Tselah got there, Ashivon was repeating one word in Nital.

_ “No… no. No. No…” _

Tselah crept closer to Sanga. He was still a little afraid of her, no matter how nice or good she was. Nevertheless, he got close. Sanga was still breathing.

_ “...no eat,” _ murmured Ashivon. He unwrapped his right arm, where a red diamond with black symbols seemed to glow and pulse.  _ “No eat. No eat, no. No! No eat…” _

His hands flexed, the left hovering over his mark on the right.

Sanga had suggested cutting that mark to cut its power over him. Tselah had heard them discuss it so casually, and had nightmares for a week.

_ Cut mark, no working, _ she had said.

_ Cut mark, Ashivon bleed big, _ he had argued quietly.  _ Ashivon die. _

_ “No,” _ Tselah said.  _ “No cut. No cut!” _

_ “No eat Sanga. No eat…” _ His breathing was getting fast, like he’d been running too long. All he was doing was standing there, wavering towards her, pushing himself away. Tears started flooding down his face. His stomach snarled, and he looked like he was fighting anger.

Tselah got louder,  _ “No cut! NO CUT!” _

_ “No eat. No eat… NO NONONONO!” _ Claws sliced. More blood spilled.

Tselah screamed.

So did Ashivon.

Sanga made a noise, too, but it was barely a murmur. She needed help, not two Intseh screaming at each other.

Ashivon was getting worse, tearing at his arm and yelling, growling, roaring…

Tselah was terrified, screaming and howling.

There needed to be help. Tselah didn’t know where to get it. It was beyond terrifying. These were the only two people he could rely on and now they were both broken in different ways.

None of them heard the Intseh woman approach. They didn’t know she was there until she said, “Calm,” and a wave of lights spread through them and Tselah felt so sleepy that he had to sit.

“No… No hurt Sanga.” Ashivon kept shaking his head. Fighting sleep. His speech always went to broken forms when he was strained.

“No hurt Sahnkah,” the stranger agreed. She moved her hands and light and warmth and comfort washed through them all. Wounds closed. Bones - Sanga’s bones - re-ordered themselves and knit as if they had never broken.

Sanga half sat up, trembling and weak, not comprehending what had just happened. She used what little energy she had to scoop both Tselah and Ashivon into her arms. She sagged almost instantly, caught up in Ashivon’s embrace. He clung to her, desperately. Shaking.

The red mark on his arm was ribbons, cut through with fresh black fur.

The stranger toured around them carefully, not making any sudden moves or loud noises, but also not attempting to conceal their presence. Very carefully, so as not to startle anyone, she removed a backpack and started revealing its contents.

The entire time, she spoke. Tselah had been working with Ashivon and Sanga’s baby-talk for so long, it was almost a shock to hear fully coherent sentences again. “There now, there now. Cry it all out. The pain is gone, but you two look like you’re in desperate straits. Breathe… When you feel ready, I have food. Simple things that shouldn’t upset you.”

Tselah said, “I don’t think they understood all that.”

“I know,” she said. “The tone of voice is more important than the words. They understand some words. I heard them. They may understand more because of that.” She smiled warmly and ran a hand through his growing hair. “I am known as Ishoverah. May I know your names?”

Since Ashivon and Sanga were busy crying and holding on to each other… it was up to Tselah. “I’m Tselah,” he said. “You know Sanga, she’s the furless from the bad place. The big grownup is Ashivon. He was in the bad place way longer than I was…”

“SANGA!”

They both turned to see Ashivon in a panic. Sanga had fallen limp and unconscious in his arms. It wasn’t the way she usually slept, with her whole self wrapped around him and her fingers flexing in his hair or in the longer fur of his shoulders and back. If her head slumped off his shoulder like it had now, she would stir herself to nestle herself back on to her preferred perch.

Tselah panicked, too. No. She couldn’t be dead! Not now! Not after all of this! It wasn’t fair, it wasn’t  _ fair! _ She’d done so much to get them here and suffered so much and--

Ishoverah was cooing and being gentle, showing Ashivon how to find Sanga’s heartbeat, how to listen for her breaths.

Ashivon was a gibbering mess. He had never cried whenever he sustained an injury, Not when the lights cut into him, not when thorn-bushes or insects stung him, not even when he hurt himself on the way down when Sanga fell. Yet now, with the very idea that Sanga might be dead or dying, he was reduced to shivering, helpless tears.

Tselah’s eyes weren’t exactly dry, either. At least  _ he _ was more reassured by Ishoverah’s calming words.

“There now, there now. Sahnkah is well. Sahnkah needs sleep, she’s been through much. Come, Ashivon, come… You can walk. I have Tselah, you come with us, now. I have somewhere safe you can both rest. This way. There’s a good young man. Up with her.”

Ashivon’s breath shuddered, and his grip on Sanga was maybe a little on the tight side, but he followed.

Ishoverah kept Tselah’s hand in hers as she lead the way. It was such a relief to see more than one other Intseh. It almost blew Tselah’s mind to see true Intseh architecture up close enough to run towards. All curves and mounds and sweeping spirals, so that the building looked grown rather than made. All bright colours and geometric patterns and Tselah almost cried because he felt like he’d come  _ home. _

But this wasn’t his home. The base colour for  _ his _ home was periwinkle and this one was mostly primrose. That, and the patterns were different, as well. All the same, it hurt his heart and healed it at the same time just to see a single Intseh building.

Inside was like most Intseh homes, all curves and adobe and daubed mud and paint to smooth it over. Ishoverah closed up the ceiling’s lightwells and turned on the light globes, which might have startled Ashivon, but he was too busy being in some kind of head fog to notice if a parade of Chevor started dancing on their hind legs. He was shivering, clinging tight to Sanga.

Ishoverah kept up her singsong and careful movements the entire time.

“Here we are, here we are. I’ve got a spare bedroom or two for guests and family… there’s a big huddle-cuddle bed, you don’t want to let go of Sahnkah, do you? No. She’s special for you, I can tell. This way, this way…”

Tselah felt compelled to say, “They need each other like people need air.”

“That, I can see.”


	10. Chapter 10

This… was going to be quite the story. Three strangers, not exactly fallen from the sky, but they had definitely fallen. Two Intseh and a strange, furless creature the likes of which Ishoverah had never seen before. Healing had drained both her and the furless, who had been breaths away from dying, and was now at risk of dying again if she didn’t get something to boost her reserves. The child, Tselah, was better help than the other two. The furless one was unconscious and the muscular male just would not let her go long enough to even scratch himself.

He was oddly wild, that one. Once this… Sahnkah… was settled in the big huddle-cuddle bed, he still cradled her with his body and rumbled a growl at anything he thought could be a threat. When he wasn’t snarling at the world, he was nuzzling and clutching at Sahnkah, wrapping himself around her out of a combination of desperate need and savage protection.

There was just something about him that screamed he was used to killing, and not for food. It was in the way he was coiled and ready to spring, even with his arms full. It was in his eyes, and the way he watched, assessing everything new for danger. It was in the way he refused to succumb to the strains of healing magic, like someone had reversed his wounds and done so more than once. More than a dozen times. It was in the way he never trusted her or this place enough to show his back, which bore a crisscross of white-furred scars. It was in the scars themselves, and the story that Ishoverah could not yet unriddle in them. She wanted to think he was a soldier, but… no soldier was wild like that.

Ishoverah had a child’s warm wrap, which more or less fit Tselah. He looked a little bit more like an ordinary child once inside it, and she could easily mistake him for one of her nephews as he helped her crush marrownuts and herbs for a strengthening paste.

“This looks like baby food,” said Tselah as he helped her in her small kitchen. There was a bigger one for feasts and family visits, but it wouldn’t do much good here and now.

“Babies eat a version of this,” she said, “to help them grow. This is to help your… friends…”

“Sanga and Ashivon,” Tselah supplied. “Sanga’s the little furless and Ashivon’s the other one.”

“Yes. Sahnkah and Ashivon. This will help them recover their strength. Healing drains both healer and healed, and without some of this…” she scattered salt into the mix, “they will weaken and might die.” Powdered marrow. Yes. And some eggs, and mashed meats… she had to make this rich, but not too rich. Good enough to strengthen them but not so fortified that it fought them. With that in mind, she watered it down enough to make it a thick soup. All the easier to swallow.

One, two, three, four bowls full. Four spoons, though Sahnkah would not find it easy to hold it in her state. A tray to carry them all on and Tselah carrying the little table to set the tray on.

Ashivon was purring when she came back to him, wrapped around Sahnkah as he was, but the purring was short and muted as his breathing was rapid. The poor lad was in shock and distress. One of his hands kept guard over Sahnkah’s heart, feeling her heartbeat. Tselah had it right. They needed each other like regular folk needed air.

The absolute  _ worst _ thing to do would be to try and pry Sahnkah out of Ashivon’s arms, right now. She’d seen it at the scree slope, and it was only more evident in this room. Sahnkah was the only good he had in the world. She would not take her from him. She might, with patience and persistence, ease the dependency he had on her, but to attempt so now was to attract his wrath.

“Here we are,” she cooed. “Good soup. Good soup for all of us. Ashivon, please sit Sahnkah up for me so she can have some.”

“Sanga sleep,” he said. “Sanga no wake.”

“I know. I have a little trick that will help,” always with the gentle singsong one might use for a skittish baby. Tselah set the table down and Ishoverah set the tray down on it. She was careful about sitting on the edge of the bed and letting Ashivon see her movements were benign. “Let us sit Sahnkah up. Gently, gently…”

A low, warning growl. Softly, though, as if to say,  _ I don’t like this, but I’m trusting you for now. If you hurt my everything, here, your life is forfeit. _

Ishoverah handled Sahnkah with exaggerated care, as if she were helping prise a weak infant from its egg. Careful of her claws, careful not to harm so much as a hair on Sahnkah’s head (and what soft hair this furless had…), careful not to get in the way when Ashivon moved possessively to take over the process.

Ishoverah demonstrated how good the soup was by having some herself. She would need the small boost for the next step, helping Ashivon feed some to Sahnkah. That required laying a gentle hand on Sahnkah’s brow and feeding her some magic. Just enough to get her aware. “Tselah… you know her words. Please help me tell her… You are safe. You need to eat.”

The furless words were strange and unintelligible to Ishoverah’s ears, but they worked. Sahnkah’s dark, corpse-like eyes tracked the spoon, and her lips accepted the soup.

Ashivon said something that Tselah translated as ‘better soup’ that make Sahnkah smile and cough a brief laugh. He took over the use of the spoon and let Ishoverah help with the bowl. Sahnkah drowsed between mouthfuls, but did manage to consume the entire bowl.

Ashivon was much more reassured when the furless snuggled against him for an improved rest. It was what allowed him to eat with Ishoverah holding his bowl. His purr solidified into comfort and comforting, and he relaxed.

“You are good people,” he said, and, “thank you.” He still clung tight to Sahnkah, and he still shook, but these were lingering after-effects of the previous devastation.

“You have encountered bad people?”

Now he moved Sahnkah to show a tattoo she had on her sternum. A circle with a diagonal bar in it, and two projections from the top. She’d seen that sign before… somewhere… but couldn’t easily recall where. This sign on Sahnkah was broken by a relatively new scar. “Bad people,” said Ashivon. “They wear this mark. They make light to hurt. They… I was… in a cage… for years. Sanga… she was the only nice one. She helped me. She helped us.”

“He has nightmares,” Tselah added between sips of soup. “Sanga sings for him and he stops being scared.”

Ashivon finished his share of the soup and let Ishoverah take away the empty bowl and dirty spoon. “She never hurt me. Never on purpose. She worked so hard to help… and in the end… we worked together to get free…” He put his face against hers, brow to brow. “We did it…  _ Wedidit. Wesavebaby.” _

Ishoverah drank her soup down, so she could begin recovering her reserves. “Sahnkah needs sleep,” she said. “So do you. You all need to heal.”

He laid Sahnkah back down, very carefully, and wrapped himself around her again. “Keep baby safe,” he murmured, shuddering as he flexed his grip on Sahnkah. “Keep close.”

Tselah, also finishing his soup, wiped his face with his arm and said, “I’ll snuggle in with them. They panic when I’m not near.” He stretched, then crawled into the covers where Ashivon added him to the embrace. “He said it’s ‘cause the bad one’s magic takes children when they’re separate from others.”

Ishoverah boggled as the strange little family fell into a drowse. The bad one’s magic? Taking children? She’d heard of that, too… but where? She dimmed the globes and left the drape over the doorway hanging down, so they could have comforting darkness. She crept away to one of the further rooms in the general spiral of an Intseh house, and made a hushed call to one of the town Elders. They might remember more about that little snippet of knowledge.


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Long chapter is long

_ Hard stone under his body, the cold morning dew in his fur, the sounds of the distant crowd beginning to gather in the arena. The hunger gnawing at him. It was another seventh day, and he was overdue for his dosage of pain and anguish… _

Ashivon…

_ His joints creaked as he rose out of his defensive huddle in the corner furthest from the latrine. His hands were scattered with grey. He was old… _

Ashivon.

_ He had grown old in this nightmare place, loveless and weary of living. Untouched and untouchable. The loneliest creature in the world, and today, he would be hauled out to the arena to kill more people for the furless… _

“Ashivon. Ashivon, it’s all right.”

_ The guards came. “Hands,” was their command and Ashivon’s joints couldn’t move fast enough for them, so they beat him and wrenched him about with their burning bonds… _

“Ashva.”

His eyes were heavy and his heart was racing but he could see… not a stone-walled cage, but a soft, dim room where the warmth of Sanga was manifest in a reassuring weight by his side. Where Tselah was a nearby blur and his little white hands were patting cautiously at his arm.

“...ashivon,” mumbled Ashivon, absently correcting Tselah and still confused. The surface under them was soft and comfortable. The place where they lay was warm and free of the normal discomforts like wind and weather and the cold of mountain stone.

Sanga still slept soundly, tucked up inside his limbs, save for one arm that gripped his middle, with the hand that gently stroked his fur.

Tselah smiled. "I know your name, silly. I had to get through the nightmare. You're safe. We're all safe. All right?"

_ See… _ Sanga in his arms. Tselah had clothes closer to something his size. The bed was large enough for all three of them and three more. Someone had made one of the blankets out of patches of cloth. It was thick and warm and all but screamed that someone cared. There was a peculiar window in the ceiling.

_ Hear… _ The soft buzzing growl-like noise Sanga made when she slept. Another living soul in a different space. There was clattering and scraping and… sizzling… Someone cooking? Birds… chirping somewhere outside, and the sound of the wind rustling plants.

_ Smell… _ Sanga was still suffering her blood time, but it was coming to a close. All three of them needed to bathe, though Tselah didn’t need it as much. He should have smelled a cooking fire, but the scent wasn’t that of burning wood… It was something else.

_ Touch… _ Sanga’s heartbeat was a reassuringly even rhythm under his hand. Ashivon reached out to ruffle Tselah’s hair. He was here and this was now, and everything was real, but it still felt like a dream. Like he would wake up at any moment, back in the cage, as if nothing had happened to make it otherwise.

Tselah had a cup. It was a simple thing, straight up and down with a muddy glaze and a zig-zag pattern pressed into its middle. “Ishoverah made spiced honey milk. It’s good.” He’d seen Ashivon run his senses like this before. He’d seen both him and Sanga doing it. He knew what the last step was.

The stuff in the cup was goat milk, but whoever Ishoverah was (a distant, foggy memory of helping hands and a calm, singsong voice, and the scent of a strange Intseh), they had added ginger, cinnamon, and something else he couldn’t name in with the honey. The warmth of it brought back a memory…

_ ...being so very small in the arms and lap of a parent who helped him hold the cup. “Drink slowly, now, Ashfa. You don’t want to make yourself sick.” But who they were to him and what their face looked like was lost in the fog… _

There were tears in his eyes. He hadn’t tasted anything of the like since… since he was Taken away by the furless to become their monster.

“Ishoverah says it’s good for you,” said Tselah.

Ashivon struggled to breathe. “You… said Ashfa… Some- someone said that be-before…”

“I said Ash _ va. _ I’m not a baby,” Tselah sulked a little bit. “I can speak properly and everything.”

“I remember… Ashfa… Someone called me… Ashfa…” Trying to remember more hurt his head.

Tselah rolled his eyes. “Probably a parent, they’re always using baby talk. And you were with the furless since you were little like me, right?”

“Yes.” With. What a word. With. It was easier than saying, _routinely tortured whilst being held prisoner._ _“They_ only gave me water...”

“Parents,” said Tselah with more certainty. “Or grandparents. It’s not like relatives can help it. They’re compelled or something, all ‘iddle liddle cheshefafafa’. Gross.” Tselah pretended to retch. “Is it bad that I miss it?”

Ashivon tried to remember anything else about his interrupted childhood. The feel of someone’s arms around him. The reassurance of someone else’s purr. The security that came from knowing that the grownups would make everything all right. “No,” he said. “It’s not bad.”

Sanga murmured and shifted around in her sleep, then went back to her steady, low, rumbling growl.

“Ishoverah says she’ll need to sleep lots,” said Tselah. “She says you should get up and move around. Sanga will be safe. Promise.”

They hadn’t left each other’s sight for longer than an hour or two since their escape from the Church’s clutches. This room only had one exit, and that was the doorway with a cloth hanging down for privacy. If someone was tall enough, they might be able to slide in or out through the light well in the ceiling, but it would be a tight fit if they were anything above Tselah’s size. Assuming they could take the cover off if they were up on the roof.

Ashivon decided that Sanga was safe enough, and eased his way out from under the covers. He felt oddly chilled without her warmth beside him and, concerned for her furless inability to repel the cold, added another layer of quilting over her lax form.

He whispered,  _ “Ashivon go. Ashivon come back,” _ to her in Nital. If she heard or acknowledged that, or his kiss to her cheek, he couldn’t tell.

Would his kind accept her? Well… they hadn’t hurt her yet. This one… Ishoverah… had helped them all. But was it more because he needed Sanga to be alive for his own stability, or because of a genuine want to help a stranger?

Tselah helped him exit the room, leading Ashivon by the hand. There was a wider space, with what appeared to be furniture, though how anyone would use it currently escaped him. And then, past another hanging cloth, was a space that had to be a kitchen. The stranger was in it, stunted adult horns poking straight up from her head, and her hair hanging loose, down past her shoulders. She smelled… peculiar. Not male. Not like Sanga. Not like anything he knew…

“Ashivon’s awake,” announced Tselah. “Ashivon, this is Ishoverah. She’s helping us.”

He couldn’t help it. The Church had taught him not to trust. “All of us?”

“Yes, all,” said Ishoverah. She was satisfied with the contents of pot and pan and placed covers on them. She was dressed as differently as Tselah was, with a simple shirt and skirt to cover most of her body. Nothing at all like the pants he was used to as his only clothes. He could see her tail came out above the skirt but under the shirt, and bore bands of black and pale blue-grey all the way down until a cubit before her tuft. “You’ll want to bathe, for sure. I have some clothes that can fit you. Tselah can help if you… prefer male help.”

Ashivon thought about it. So far, his experiences with bathing were either buckets of water thrown aggressively at wherever the blood stuck to his fur, or swimming in clean, often chill, flowing water in the wild. On one hand, he desperately wanted to be clean… on the other, he dreaded warming up afterwards.

“It’s not like the streams,” said Tselah, apparently reading his mind. “It’s warm, and there’s better soap, and  _ body combs.” _

“Body--”

“You’ll like it,” Tselah seized his hand and pulled him onwards, through connecting doorways. This place was built almost in a spiral, like a snail shell. The core of it was the communal space, the little kitchen, and the bedroom he’d recently vacated, but as it grew outwards, so did its capacity for occupation. As well as its capacity for use.

The new room was all over baked clay tiles, this time in warm, sunny colours and a glossy sheen that reflected distorted images of himself. There was…

A window that wasn’t a window, showing him himself, and Tselah, but the wrong way around. The image of him did everything he did. It was… a  _ mirror… _ he hadn’t seen one since…  _ before. _

Compared to the happy and reassured Tselah, Ashivon looked like a bundle of nerves and coiled aggression, just waiting to snap inside and fall apart.

There was a sort of seat over a hole… and a booth with knee-high walls and a deeper pit within, and some form of… metal… above and attached to the wall.

“This is a  _ bathtub,” _ said Tselah, pointing it out. “That’s the privy, and this is the sink. You make dirt into the privy hole and when you’re done…” He demonstrated it all, including the Intseh way of cleaning up after eliminating waste (he’d never had anything in the cage and Sanga showed him the right leaves in the wild) and how to activate the trapdoor-blades that sent all waste into a complicated system for generating gas (the same gas Ishoverah was burning to cook with, Tselah explained) and making fertiliser for the crops.

It took Ashivon some time to understand the concept of  _ hot water _ since he’d only ever encountered the stuff at ambient temperature or below. It took even longer to understand  _ bubble bath, _ and soaking in warm water to relax and be clean.

Ishoverah said (Ishoverah said a lot, according to Tselah) that Ashivon might benefit from a hot bath, though it might make him feel weaker to climb out of it. That’s why there were hand-rails and steps in the tub. If he wanted privacy, there was another cloth to lower on the inside of the bathing room (bathroom, Tselah told him) so that polite people wouldn’t just barge in and see everything Ashivon didn’t want them to see.

During this extended lecture, Ishoverah passed in clean clothes that smelled of camphor-wood, and a large sheet of fluffy cloth that Tselah introduced as a  _ towel. _ A piece of fabric exclusively for helping a body get dry. It boggled Ashivon’s mind.

Hot perfumed water and the white noise of the bubbles popping did help him relax and feel calmer, even when Tselah helped him wash his hair. He struggled to emerge, just as predicted, spitting at the water dripping from his hair and into his face, and itching to shake most of it off.

“No, no, we drain the water and shake in the tub,” explained Tselah.  _ “Babies _ shake the instant they get out.” He, too, was sopping and dripping as he moved the plug, but helped Ashivon back in so they could close the partition around the bathing stall and shudder most of the water loose from their bodies.

The towel felt wonderful. Far better than the perpetual itch of air-drying after a dip. Then -oh deaf gods, it was a wonder- the absolute paradise of the body comb and brush. Every subtle itch and grandiose tangle on every inch of his skin just soothed away by the spines and bristles. Well. Not  _ every _ inch. Tselah cautioned against using the sharp spines of the comb or the robust bristles of the brush on his privates. There was a special, softer brush for  _ there. _

So many rules came with that territory. Five strokes or you’re playing with it. Not too slow, not too fast, and never against the grain. Always wash the brush after use in a shared house and let it dry in the special rack so the bristles didn’t get deformed or broken.

Ashivon found it hard to keep up. Especially when it came to the new clothing. He’d never had  _ underwear _ before, and its snug confines felt strange after years of relative freedom inside the Church’s pants and nothing else. Similarly, the pants Ishoverah had to spare felt strange. Too close to his hind end, too close to his thighs, too loose by his calves. Sure, he could run and pounce, but the way they flapped about distracted him.

Then there was the shirt. He had no memory of ever wearing a shirt. It tickled the upper base of his tail and rubbed against his chest and arms in odd ways. Yes, it did help him stay a little bit warmer, but… he just wasn’t used to it.

There was a coat to go over the shirt, since he was shivering (shock, Ishoverah said, stealing the heat from his body. Or he was used to much warmer climes and would adjust in time.) and the thick, soft fabric did perform as they said. It had a split in the back, so his tail could escape to cool, or lurk under to stay warm. 

Finally, there were house slippers and a soft sort of hat with slots for a set of horns. Tselah demonstrated how to use both, fitting the hat for his own head and sort of shuffling into the slippers, which were sort of… pockets… for their feet.

He had to admit, he felt a lot better for being clean and warm. He felt much more relaxed after he checked on Sanga and found her still asleep.

There was a chunky soup for Tselah and himself, and tea for Ishoverah. There was more than a portion of the paste-like soup for Sanga. She had suffered more, and would need to rebuild her reserves, Ishoverah explained. They would feed her together, after they’d had their own food.

“But first,” Ishoverah insisted. “I need to know everything you know… about where you went, and what you suffered. You’re the first among us who’s vanished and then come back. Our people want to know everything you can share.” She had a device on the table, it had a light and what looked like a slow-turning spool of ribbon, winding from one side to the other. “This will record your words, so that others may hear everything as you say it. It will help so you don’t have to repeat everything for everyone.”

“I… don’t know what to say,” he said. How could he explain it? How could he talk about everything when he didn’t know  _ everything _ that was different?

“Start with what you remember about how you were taken away, and what you saw when you got to the furless lands.”

He scooped Tselah into his arms. “It was night, I remember… We were in bed… My parents and I… I remember… the light… wrapping me up like a fly in a spider-web. My mother… she… tried to pull me out. She was bleeding and hurt and calling my name...and then I was in the middle of a circle of furless… and naked… They just had pants for me… I asked them what was happening. I asked… where the rest of the clothes were. They didn’t understand. They just… showed me a stone woman with the symbol.” He drew it in the air, over his chest.

Those early memories were fragments. Pain and solitude and waiting for something to make sense… and Sanga… the only person in the world who ever did.


	12. Chapter 12

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the chapter with the miscarriage mention. Very brief and no associated trauma.
> 
> Also big thanks to dexteri-art on Tumblr for the lovely idea about Ashivon's peet-claws. You're a genius and I love you.

Though she was in contact with quite a lot of learned people, they had all decided not to swarm on her lonely little farmhouse in the country. She had more than enough medication to see her into the next month without needing an expedition to the pharmacist, more than enough supplies, thanks to the farm’s stores. More than enough help with Tselah at her ankles and Ashivon picking up from his example…

She certainly had more than enough to do with this big mystery landing literally in her backyard. Tselah’s testimony was a lot briefer than Ashivon’s. The child’s story took up half a reel. Ashivon’s eventually consumed five. Though he remembered more and more Intsehli, he still had the vocabulary of a child, and explaining some things took more time than they had to. Ishoverah helped where she could, but… it was still slow.

Sahnkah was the biggest puzzle. She smelled like she was suffering a miscarriage, yet Ashivon and Tselah alike swore she went through the ordeal once a month. She’d had it three times in their journey so far, including the last one in Ishoverah’s spare huddle-cuddle bed. She was small like a child, but both Ashivon and Tselah insisted she was as grown as she would get. Her body was strange, too. So were the stories about her.

She could travel at a steady trot that ran food-beasts to exhaustion, she could make things that were useful for tools and travel, and sometimes put things together without seeing their like before. She could eat things that sickened an Intseh, and sometimes drew health from them. Things that should be impossible, yet both males insisted that it was true. They’d seen it with their own eyes.

Of course, she wasn’t invulnerable. She bled just like any other living creature. She suffered the cold more intensely than any Intseh would, but could endure the heat better than any Intseh, too. She could get sick just like anyone else. She could live on a diet of all plant-stuff, where an Intseh would sicken and gradually perish.

Ashivon said she used to be able to summon healing magics, and make a staff of light, when the mark on her chest was intact. That power was lost to her, now.

All that testimony was labeled and wrapped, ready for delivery, now. In a parcel marked for the nearest hub of learning and science. There, it would be copied, transcribed, studied and analysed by the keenest minds present. It would also be sent to other hubs in other cities and towns, for other learned and learning to study.

Sankhah was slower at recovering, stumbling from bed long enough to use the privy, eat, and return to sleep. It was only in recent days that she was strong enough to explain -through Tselah’s translations- how life was in the country she knew as home.

It was so confusing. How could  _ any _ peoples treat a baby as  _ unwanted? _ It boggled the mind. Yet Sahnkah insisted that she was one such child, and that there were many more like it. Children without families raised in groups... that, Ishoverah could understand. Intseh towns all over used a form of creche care for the seasonal influx of little ones… but they all had parents, families, and caregivers to see to their needs.

The very idea of a group of  _ twenty unwanted babies _ just refused to settle in Ishoverah’s head. Even though they were furless babies, some part of Ishoverah wanted to fly directly to these…  _ orphanages… _ and scoop up an armful of babies to nourish and raise herself. The furless didn’t want their own children! How could that possibly happen?

Sahnkah tried to explain and Ishoverah tried to understand. The furless had no trouble growing babies - though the means by which they did so eluded her understanding - so they had a surplus. They had funny rules that said a mother had to have a bonded male to father the children, otherwise she was shamed and worth little, if she could not possibly be worth less. The furless somehow believed that mothers -regardless of bonded status- were not worth any value beyond being mothers.

Motherhood was the most sanctified part of being a woman in Sahnkah’s lands, but only if that mother was bonded. A woman was expected to keep growing babies annually until she died in the effort, and therefore became a minor saint.

It sounded incomprehensible to Ishoverah.

Sahnkah decided to avoid such sainthood, preferring to use her gifts to help as many as she could… and finally snapping at her people’s treatment of Ashivon.

_ The things that her people taught her about Intseh were so wrong that they were almost abominable… _

Fortunately for all involved, Sahnkah was smart enough to work out that her people lied to her, and did what she could within the system until there was no living in the system any more. By all accounts, it was a miracle they made it out alive.

By two weeks into her recovery, Sahnkah was testing herself. Stretching limbs and testing muscle, she journeyed outside Ishoverah's home to put herself in a series of poses that Ashivon joined, and Tselah mimicked. It looked… somewhat like exercise, but it looked also like fighting. Like training.

Fortunately for their overhall health, it also allowed Ishoverah to spot something ill about Ashivon. Well.  _ Further _ ill. The gods big and small knew that that young man had been through several colours of hell, all whilst not being treated properly.

Ashivon walked with some difficulty, and he had his claws out at all times. She  _ thought _ he’d had his claws out at all times. Maybe he couldn’t help it.

Ishoverah waited until Sahnkah had to rest and, whilst Ashivon was fussing over her, asked to have a closer look at his feet. His claws were black, as they should be, but upon applying gentle pressure to a toe… a wickedly long hook of a blade almost pierced his toe bean before she halted it. Sahnkah was appropriately alarmed at the sight of it. Her surprised exclamation was in Nital, but Tselah translated it as, “How do you  _ walk?” _

Ashivon was withdrawn and nearly mute as always, “Carefully.”

Ishoverah let his foot go. “This is bad for your feet, bad for your walk… if it goes any further, you can cut yourself… Didn’t you have a scratching pad?”

Shrug. “Tore it to shreds too often,” he said. “They stopped giving me one.”

Aie! If anything was going to make her violent, it was that statement. Nevertheless, she couldn’t take it out on Sahnkah. She was only one of her people and a blunder this monumental simply  _ had _ to be the work of a committee. Through their small translator, the conversation went something like this:

“You let his feet get this bad?”

“I didn’t know this was bad!”

“How could you not know this was bad?”

“There were other people seeing to his needs, I just did the healing! I thought this was normal…”

It took a lot longer, with stops for clarification. Ishoverah had, after all, heard the testimonies of all three of them. She took some time to settle herself. It wasn’t her fault. It wasn’t Sahnkah’s fault. It wasn’t Ashivon’s fault and Tselah was too young to know all the details of self-care.

This was yet another thing for discussions with distant experts, and in the meantime…

“I know this is too soon, but I can’t leave the three of you alone, and you… you have  _ needs, _ Ashivon. We have to go shopping.”

It was never as simple as it sounded. Ishoverah tried to bring out the autocart, but Sahnkah and Ashivon were both terrified of it the instant she started the crystals turning. They bolted for the nearest thing to shelter and armed themselves with whatever came to hand. No amount of cajoling, convincing, or careful explanation could get them to come near it.

Therefore… they had to walk.

On one hand, it would help wear down Ashivon’s terrible claws, but… his every step also held the risk of self-injury. Worse… it was  _ springtime _ .


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aaaaaugh I keep forgetting to update this! Get on my arse about it, pls?

Hrintor and Vertseh  _ had _ been minding their own business, catching up with family news and local gossip as was the sisters’ wont. There was, of course, the news of the strangers who came in with the landslide. Knocked about, you know, they’ve been recovering at Ishoverah’s ranch house, close to where they landed.

Reports varied, but there was a big male and two little ones. Speculation expanded that to a father fleeing some catastrophe with the remains of his family, or some exile seeking a new beginning. There was a little boy, of that the rumour mill was certain, but the other child… that was the bone of contention.

It was a girl. It was stolen. It was deformed. It wasn’t Intseh, but something else. It wasn’t a child, but some kind of exotic animal they had as a pet… Nobody was sure.

At least, not until the wind changed.

Ishoverah’s scent was on that wind, as was the scent of an adult stranger. They could tell he was an active fellow, well-maintained and healthy. They could even tell he was nervous. His scent tantalised their instincts with the promise of new, robust, healthy genes for them to speculate on a future with.

Both ladies turned to face the wind. Ishoverah was only shorter than this new stranger if one counted his horns.

“Mmm-mmm…” Hrintor appreciated that still-distant silhouette. “If he was cake, I wouldn’t mind getting fat…”

Even at a distance, they could tell that he was almost solid muscle. The way he moved, the way he matched his pace to the smaller ones on either side of him… that would make an excellent father.

Vertseh elbowed her sister. “You already have three to keep you warm. Leave some servings for the starving.”

“You know I’m perfectly willing to share.”

“Pff. No. They’re all yours.  _ Him, _ I would take for a ride. Any. Day.”

The scent of the others reached them. A male child, they almost dismissed. If either of them wanted to get close to the beautiful stranger, they would have to pay attention to his little ones. It wasn’t the boy who confused them. It was the other one.

They were of a height with the boy, and the first impression of their scent confounded them. This one smelled like… a fertile female? Next, the fact that their stride was not a normal way of walking. Next was the shape. No tail, no mobile ears, and a funny, lumpy form that was decidedly  _ not _ Intseh.

The sisters stared, there was no other way of learning. They all but ignored Ishoverah and the little boy in favour of staring at…

A strange furless creature the size of a child. Skin strangely pale, though it was red in some patches. And her eyes! So like a corpse! How could anyone stand to be near…  _ that? _

It was unnatural.

Ishoverah stopped to greet them. “Good morning, Hrintor, Vertseh. These are the newcomers, Ashivon, Sahnkah, and this is little Tselah. Sahnkah is a _Human_ from the farlands. They’ve come a long way seeking safety.”

Sahnkah had dark tattoos on her. Bands of black on her wrists and a circular symbol with a scar of a cut right through it. Her clothing had been through much, by the looks of it. All of them had.

“Halu?” said Sahnkah, offering a clawless hand. And she turned to Tselah and said,  _ “DidIgetthatright?” _

Tselah said something in the same tongue and then dragged out the proper way to pronounce ‘hello’.

“Heh-low,” said Sahnkah. Her hand still offered.

“Humans grab each other’s hands,” said Tselah. “To be friends.”

Ridiculous. How could anyone get to know a scent that way?

Ashivon, behind Sahnkah, also offered his hand. “Hello, good morning, how-is-your-day,” he said. It was only the last that betrayed it all as a rehearsed set of phrases. Poor fellow was so nervous.

Vertseh took her chance, reeling him in close and inhaling at his jawline. So he was a little shorter than the average male, but he was definitely prime stock. “You are going to make some ladies very happy,” she said. “I hope to be one.”

When she pulled back, he was fluffed up like a baby who had just found its own reflection for the first time. Hackles, hair, tail fluff and all. Even the spinal ridge of his tail was poking up.

Ishoverah was not impressed. “He and Sahnkah do not know Intseh ways. Restrain yourself.”

Vertseh found the mark on his wrist. The ghost of a diamond in red and some other symbol in black were still visible. “What’s this?”

“Shame,” said Ashivon, and retreated, covering it up with his other hand. “Pain. Hunger.” His claws flexed against his own flesh and Vertseh realised that some of those dark-furred ribbons through the red mark matched Ashivon’s own talons.

Sahnkah moved to comfort him, coaxing his hands away from self harm. “We go see fix,” she said, and Ashivon seemed to know what that meant.

“Be calm,” Ishoverah advised. “It’s spring. Some people have no control in spring.”

“No want no control,” murmured Ashivon. “Dangerous.”

Hrintor casually got her sister into a headlock. “It’s a matter of will, dear. Some people don’t  _ want _ to control themselves. I’m sure you’ll be fine.”

Ishoverah urged the party onwards as Vertseh struggled for freedom. “We have to move. It’s a long walk.”

Vertseh still refused to help herself. “See you later, Tochva…”

“Tochva? My name is Ashivon.”

“Keep moving,” said Ishoverah, herding the strange family onwards. “She’s calling you attractive.”

Barely audible. “Me? Attractive? Am I?”

Sweet maker deities, he was entirely too much. Strong, naive, shy,  _ and _ virile all in one package.

Vertseh was just among the first to openly drool in Ashivon’s direction.


	14. Chapter 14

Sanga realised that the path they were taking was avoiding something. As long as it was avoiding those haunted carriages, she was fine with it. The rest of her brainpower was devoted to trying to sort out what was going on in this Intseh town. She had met a total of two Intseh men and three Intseh women, and now there were others. They didn’t seem to have any kind of dress code, no garb to tell men apart from women or workers apart from the gentry.

She was still unriddling which clothes were harder to make when she noticed the trail of onlookers. Their party was certainly turning heads, that was true, but most of the heads… didn’t have horns.

Ishoverah had horns. Short, yet spiky ones, like the ones under Ashivon’s baby horns when he shed them during puberty.

The woman in question said, through translation, “I can feel you staring. Yes, I have horns. Yes, I am a woman. It’s… complicated for me.”

Sanga had never heard of it before, and when it was explained to her - that some folk felt uncomfortable with the gender they were born into - she chalked it up as more Intseh peculiarities. They were, after all, prepared. Ishoverah was seeing experts to help her with the changes she needed, taking medicine to help her, too, and that was that. The arrival of Sanga, Ashivon and Tselah hadn’t even caused an inconvenience for Ishoverah, and her changes were happening on the same schedule as if the trio had never landed in her backyard.

Intseh women were built a lot like Intseh men. The differences between them were minor - horns for the men, none for the ladies. Well. Most of the time. They preferred to wear shirts or drapes or dresses as their mood suited them, but those doing strenuous labors removed their tops.

There were blue-ish ones like Ashivon, pale, silver-white ones like Tselah, sandy-coloured ones, and even those whose black markings were a dark, dark brown. She could spot all kinds of different markings of dark and light. Markings that looked like gloves, socks, ear decoration… there were stripes and spots and almost geometric-looking patterns to the edges… there were even some Intseh who had stripes in their hair… and it was the women who were looking at Ashivon as if they wanted to eat him alive.

Tselah paid it no mind, and it was only his casual attitude that stopped her bolting for the relative safety of Ishoverah’s home. That, and the fact that Ashivon couldn’t -and shouldn’t- really run that far.

They clung tightly to each other, surrounded by new things. Curving paths seemingly made from one impossibly long stone. Buildings in the distance that were taller than the tallest spire the Church had ever made, with gardens in them that defied gravity. Intseh, all around, staring at them. Sanga felt like she was being weighed in the balance and found wanting. Finally, there was the wide road.

Sanga had seen traffic before. Carts, wagons, horses, and people all getting in each others way in the narrow streets of the Divine Capital. She had not ever seen traffic like  _ this. _

She had thought  _ one _ haunted cart was frightening with its constant hissing breath and unexpected pops… the street ahead of her was  _ teeming _ with them, charging at each other with entire Intseh families aboard, or entire loads of goods piled high in baskets. There were no collisions, for all that they were charging at each other. They missed. Again and again. It was impossible, but it kept on happening.

Ashivon had as tight a grip on her as she had on him, both of them shaking like leaves, almost too terrified to move. Sanga wanted to close her eyes and be four again, the last age when if she didn’t see the threat, the threat could not see her. Yet if she did that, if she  _ could _ do that, she would leave Ashivon defenceless against these unholy monsters.

They had their backs to the wall and a firm grip on each other, and it seemed like forever before Ishoverah turned up in their view with Tselah and encouraged them further along, towards a door and the relative safety of an interior entirely unlike Ishoverah’s home.

It was all pale colours. Cream, yellow, grey, white, and even some green. Smooth and rounded just like everything else made by the Intseh, and decorated in similar geometric shapes. Seating seemed to be benches covered in soft cushioning, some of which were already in use by other Intseh. One had their arm in a sling and another was holding a child far smaller than Tselah. The child was draped loosely over its parent and not wearing much more than what had to be a diaper.

Personally, Sanga wanted nothing more than a nice, quiet corner to brace herself and Ashivon against so she could defend him from literally everything that frightened her. There were no corners for her. Not even a table to hide under.

An Intseh in yellows and greys entered and spotted the four of them. She - the females normally had no horns - said something brief and ushered in the older male into another room before returning for a hushed conversation with Ishoverah and Tselah.

She couldn’t follow all of it, but words occasionally filtered past her terror.  _ Feet. Bad. Help. Not ready. Scared… _ There were more complicated words that sounded menacing for their complexity.

Ashivon was just as ready to fight for her safety as she was ready to fight for his. There was no need, since the Intseh in yellow and grey was genial and had a soothing tone of voice. She coaxed Ashivon onto a bench and palpated one of his toes, making a noise Sanga understood from  _ her _ days as a healer.

_ Drastic action was going to be needed. _

In the Church,  _ drastic action _ was generally amputation or fast, brutal surgery with a Healer Adept hovering nearby for the very instant that the offensive part was removed. If the patient was lucky, they would be allowed to seek obliteration through alcohol before the cleric surgeons sank their knives in.

Drastic action was always a rough trip. She would hold him down, she decided, or help hold him down, since he was literally twice her height and probably four times her weight. She would sing, coo, distract him… whatever it took to get him past whatever the Intseh version of drastic action was.

He could hate her for it later, but he would be alive and better for it.

A different Intseh in yellow and grey appeared as the other one went away, this time taking the parent and child aside. The Intseh with a sling emerged whole and hearty, with no sign of their previous injury. If anyone paid for the services, there was no sign of it for Sanga.

The Intseh woman returned, and all four of them trooped through a curvilinear labyrinth to a room with a higher bench where Ashivon -and only Ashivon- was directed to sit.

Sanga remained steadfast, not letting go of his hand.

There was a tub, filled with a liquid that steamed slightly and smelled vaguely floral, and vaguely of citrus. Ashivon had to soak his feet in it whilst flexing his claws against something that looked like a metal sandal on each foot. The liquid soon turned opaque, and Sanga picked up a new Intsehli word -  _ normal. _ As in,  _ This is normal, _ or,  _ This normally happens. _

Tselah crouched by the tub on the same side Sanga occupied and seemed to be peering into the opaque fluid for anything gross, cool, interesting, or any combination of the three.

Sanga knew the type. Children of a certain age were fearless if introduced as such a combination, and recovered from their fears so much faster than - say - their parents. Her concern was with Ashivon.  _ “No hurt Ashivon?” _

He smiled for her. “No hurt Ashivon.” Just as he said that, there was a cracking noise from within the clouded fluid. “No hurt Ashivon,” he repeated, with greater emphasis.

_ “There’s one! Nasty!” _ Tselah chirped, Ishoverah caught his hand before he could scoop something, bare-handed, out of the murky water. The attending Intseh handed Tselah a large pair of tweezers and held a dish. Tselah was eager to help, fishing out a wicked hook of a piece of nail… curved and sharp at one end like a talon, flat on the other.

There were three more, equally large, and Sanga was surprised that nothing in this entire process was as drastic as she had feared.

Ashivon leaned forward to peer into the liquid and watch fragments of his own talons rising from the murk, so Sanga gradually let go to assist in the removal of them from its surface. She could see how this was a relief for Ashivon, and how fun it was for Tselah… and she was learning a little of the healing ways of these people. Simple solutions, even for complicated problems. It made sense. Instead of amputating a toe, or even a foot, it was far better to encourage the overgrown nail material to slough off as it should have.

After the thinner and thinner shards floated to the surface less and less, the attending Intseh left the room and returned a few minutes later with a set of thick scratching pads. Far thicker than the ones that had once been attached to the floor of Ashivon’s cell.

His feet dried and the claws tested and found acceptable, he was lectured on how to use the pads for both hands and feet. Sanga could tell that much by the mimed instructions. Tselah translated the bit about waiting for Ashivon’s nails to dry out, because she asked about that bit.

He would be fine to walk home, they said, but they would have preferred that Ashivon rode in their haunted carts rather than walked. The instant this information reached their understanding, Sanga and Ashivon clung to each other and protested against going anywhere near one of those things even after they were cold and dead.

Tselah rolled his eyes and explained that they were afraid of  _ autocarts. _ Which resulted in some confusion from the attending Intseh.

They may have lived with those horrible haunted carts, but Sanga and Ashivon had never seen anything of their ilk for most of their lives.


	15. Chapter 15

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies for forgetting this again. Get on my case, darnit!

Ashivon had one hand firmly in Sanga’s, and the other had a good grip on Tselah as they emerged from the bright halls of Daselehravan’s most convenient medical centre. The autocarts were fewer in number, but the difference between twenty-or-so and fifteen didn’t matter a lick to either him or Sanga. To the both of them, they were strange, haunted carts drawn by the ghosts of horses or oxen. They both felt much better when they retreated away from the strange, smooth  _ roads _ and their unnatural occupants.

“You’re being silly,” Tselah insisted. “They’re just autocarts. They’re machines.  _ We _ control  _ them, _ not the other way around.”

Sanga said, “Autocarts being tame?”

“No. They’re things. Tools. You’re not afraid of hammers, are you?”

Sanga switched to Nital,  _ “If a hammer was hitting things by itself, I would be.” _

He followed suit,  _ “It’s not doing that. They don’t do anything on their own. People make them move, make them go places.” _

It took him a while to notice, what with his talons still feeling a little on the fragile side, but his stride was a lot easier. It also took him a while to notice the gathering crowd of followers. When he  _ did _ notice them, he instinctively took a defensive stance, putting himself between them, Sanga, Tselah, and even Ishoverah.

Sanga didn’t stand behind him for long, she moved herself to provide an additional bulwark against whatever this was, ready to take on an entire cluster of Intseh unarmed if she had to. He loved her tenacity and ferocity, but she would die in the attempt. Even one small child was a match for an adult furless.

Ashivon decided that he would die before he let Sanga come to harm again.

“They’re not attacking you, calm down,” insisted Ishoverah. “They’re  _ interested. _ Springtime, remember?”

Ashivon had his doubts. “They look ready to pounce.”

“Only to lavish affection on you,” sighed Ishoverah. “They want you to help make their babies.”

Now he had very strong doubts. “But… I don’t want to do that.”

Ishoverah looked confused and worried. “We should have that looked at, too. There are some who are… muted… but spring and its power are never completely denied.” She tutted and sighed. Then gestured at the following crowd. “Shoo! You’re scaring the poor fellow. He’s not interested.”

The older ones dispersed first, some of the younger adults lingered, their gazes raking over his body like Tselah raking through a bone pile, looking for uncracked long bones. The direction of the wind changed, bringing the scent of lady Intseh to him, but the scent was something different. Something… something that should have sparked something in him.

What he felt was a rumbling in his gut. Hungry again. Hungry still. The mark of the Churchlands always ignited his hunger in weird moments. He’d learned to ignore it until he started feeling faint. Similarly, he had forced himself to let everyone else eat first before seeking his own fill. Not that he ever  _ got _ his fill that often. He was used to it, and had learned that complaining did nothing. Well, it did nothing in the Churchlands.

When they had been running through the wilderness, he had complained exactly once, and watched as Sanga ran herself ragged trying to fill his endless appetite. He did not complain again.

The trailing group of Intseh women seemed to at least pick up on his discomfort and confusion, and ebbed away, leaving only a scattering of half-grown girls who were still in the process of shedding their baby horns. They hung back and giggled a lot and seemed to radiate mortification like a bonfire.

Ishoverah insisted that they were harmless, and Ashivon wanted to believe her. He discovered that he didn’t like being followed, no matter how far back his followers were, nor how relatively helpless they were. He kept having visions of his handlers, back in the Church. The one with the light staff and the one with the burning hands and the ready fist… and the buckets of cold water and the sick, creeping feeling of the mark when it invaded his mind.

“See,” said Sanga, gently petting down the raising fur on his arms.

He loved how she could tell when he needed that.  _ “Ashivon see Sanga,” _ he said in Nital.  _ “See smile.” _

Tselah, walking a little ahead, made some retching noises.

“All good there?” said Ishoverah. She looked concerned.

“Ashivon was lost in a bad memory,” Tselah explained. “Sanga’s helping, but they’re being gross about it.” More retching noises. “Sanga, Sanga, Sangafafa. Bleh.”

“What is mean ‘fafa’?” asked Sanga.

That was enough derailment to have him interested in the here and now, too. He had heard ‘va’ and ‘fa’ tacked on to names and descriptions, but had no idea of it’s meaning. Va was a diminutive, often taken to mean ‘beloved’, but babies couldn’t pronounce their V’s so well and favoured the easier F sound. So the ‘fa’ suffix was a cuter form of the suffix.

Ashivon tried it. “Sangava?”

“GROOOOOSSS!” Tselah protested. “Just stick to kissing!”

“Can’t kiss and walk,” he said, unhelpfully.

“Ashivon-va?” Sanga tried.

“Almost,” said Ishoverah. “It would be ‘Ashiva’ if you want to get it right.”

“Ashiva…” Sanga grinned.

“Sangava.”

Tselah was not impressed. “Great. Now they’ll be cute with each other all  _ day. _ Why’d you have to make them go be gross?”

“Some day, you may not mind it so much.”

The giggling girls behind them were shoving each other, much to his alarm. He twitched and jumped every time their movement caught his peripheral vision. It reminded him too much of the arena, how he could never catch the handlers’ approaches until too late, when they reached striking distance and beat him. Or of the ‘training’ in the cage, where one was always on the edge of his vision, no matter which way he turned.

“Breathe,” insisted Sanga. “Small Intseh. Babies.  _ No eat child, _ yes?”

_ Hunger and blood and sand and the roaring of the crowds far above… _ And warm arms around him and her scent and the scent of the baby… of Tselah.

He wasn’t in those stone halls. He wasn’t in the cage. He was sitting on grass with Sanga and Tselah in his arms and a trembling grip on them both.

Ishoverah wasn’t near, she was lecturing the girls. Telling them as gently as she could that Ashivon had been in a very bad place that was very cruel, and some things that seemed innocent could remind him of the bad things.

A lanky young lady with flowers in her braids circled nervously around and, meekly squeaking, trembled out, “We didn’t mean to be mean, sir… Um. We. We, uh…” she glanced back at her pack. “Wethinkyousmellrealnice.” And then she ran off under a cloud of embarrassment and giggly squealing.

“That’s them gone for the day,” Ishoverah sighed. She sat with them on the grass by the path. “You need food,” she decided. “You have that dizzy look and I know you have some kind of eating issue. Food for all. I know a place that should be very nice for you.”

It was, but they had to brave proximity to the haunted carts again. He and Sanga edged along the curves of the buildings, as far from the terrifying roads as they could get. He was never happier to be inside a building and surrounded by the scent of food.

This was his introduction to the phrase,  _ All you can eat, _ and it was nearly his undoing.


	16. Chapter 16

Tselah made sure Ashivon and Sanga got a nice corner to hide in, and then explained the concept of  _ buffet _ to them. Daselehravan was a small Intseh town with light traffic, and they were still spooked by like a handful of autocarts and a few tall buildings. Sanga was almost ready to fight everything that crossed her path, and Ashivon… Ashivon kept drifting off into his painful yesterdays.

He would need people helping him for the rest of his life, but coping with today seemed to be the biggest challenge. Ishoverah was right, food helped fortify a shaken spirit, but… she had no idea how hungry Ashivon could get.

The last time they’d slaughtered a big herbivore… he’d consumed most of it, slowing down only when his belly protested at being too full. It was that mark on his right wrist, making him hungry even when he should have been retching from too much food. He didn’t know when he was full.

He tried to warn Ishoverah, but she was in Parent Mode, not quite listening to what a child had to say. Sanga tried, too, but too late and too little. Her grasp of Intsehli couldn’t cover the necessities and, once Ashivon understood that he could have  _ all the food he wanted, _ there was no turning back.

Sanga had a more staid selection, carefully avoiding the foodstuffs she knew she reacted to, and largely stayed out of Ashivon’s way. Tselah did the same, but snuck as many treats as he thought he could get away with onto his plates. Ashivon was, after all, providing enough of a distraction. Returning to their table with a plate packed to capacity with everything he could fit on there, then spending ten or so minutes eating it all like he hadn’t eaten in days, often forgetting to use the cutlery. Sanga, used to less cutlery than Intseh had devised, provided an interesting counterpoint in trying to manage them.

As far as Tselah understood things, the furless people had knives and spoons, and only one kind of spoon at that. Sanga had never seen a fork, nor wielded a set of chopsticks and it showed. Tselah and Ishoverah kept trying to teach them, but there was little in the way of success. Ashivon’s mind was solidly on eating as much as possible in as little time as possible and Sanga was trying every taste she could both acquire and combine.

Ashivon ate too much, too fast. Sanga had said that he had always been hungry, and was told that all his kind were always hungry. Tselah had just been the first to prove that a lie. It must have been something the Church did, and the only lingering remnant of their influence was the ribbons of the mark on his arm.

While Sanga reached her sufficiency, and Ashivon continued to get more helpings, she explained the mark through Tselah’s help. Tselah had seen it, too, and could confirm the shape and design… but what it did…

Sanga had seen it used once, when Ashivon was worn ragged from a glut of executions. One of his handlers made a peculiar gesture and Ashivon… wasn’t Ashivon any more. He was a savage and angry beast, determined to kill without mercy.

Ashivon, temporarily at the table at the time, murmured, “...don’t like no control.” He actually paused in his constant chewing. “That mark… makes bad hunger.”

Ishoverah, watching him eat and growing increasingly alarmed, said, “I think it’s still making hunger.”

Ashivon had his mouth full again. “Mmmh?”

“I’ve never seen anyone just… ignore the pull of springtime like you have. Even the most devoted men would notice the scent of a fertile female. Of course, the reaction beyond the instinctual was up to the man in question, but… Ashivon had been trailing women like a hyperactive mother duck trailing ducklings, not a single one of them made any impact on him at all… beyond the hunger that now ruled his actions. This has to be dangerous.”

Sanga listened to the translation, patiently catching up with events. She grew increasingly alarmed as understanding reached her. Her eyes darted to Ashivon’s middle and said, “Ashivon stop. Eat hurt Ashivon.”

“Hungry,” he protested.

“Always hungry,” said Sanga.

“It’s the mark. It’s making you hungry,” insisted Tselah. “Feel the other things.”

He paused, licking his hands, and realised. He had eaten far too much He winced and grabbed at his gut. “Hate. This. Mark.”

Ishoverah ushered them out and back onto the paths distant from the main road. Once he had the wind in his face and an absence of scents messing with his instincts, Ashivon walked much slower than normal. Not the careful tread of a man with dangerously overgrown toe-claws, but the equally careful pace of someone who had - all unknowing - eaten themself sick.

His left hand flexed over the remains of his mark, now and again. He wasn’t sure. Nobody was sure if he could erase it that way. It was harder to cancel out than Sanga’s mark, that was for sure.

“We need an expert,” said Tselah. “Ashivon needs to get rid of that thing  _ properly.” _


	17. Chapter 17

Two days after the buffet incident, Intseh maidens began gathering a set distance away from them as they trained. The regular movement gave Ashivon something to focus on just as it gave her a means to feel worthy. Sanga could only guess what Tselah got out of it.

The gathering watchers started out as a small cluster on the distant fence-line. Hanging on the wooden bars that were a nominal declaration of territory. When she looked over again, there were five small clusters, and Ashivon was looking nervous. He knew, now, what the scent of a fertile Intseh lady could do to him.

Whoever their expert was, Ishoverah said they were arriving in a week or two. That meant that Sanga had to get creative about these observers. They were following their own instincts and -physically speaking- Ashivon was a catch. In other areas -mentally and emotionally- he would be the first to admit that he was a wreck.

Sanga touched his arm in understanding. “Ashivon finding stinky work for doing?”

He smooched her forehead before walking off towards Ishoverah’s house. Sanga took Tselah with her as a translator and walked - staff in hand - towards the clusters of observers.

What shocked her the most was that some of these young observers were apparently males. Those that scattered would be back. It was those bold enough to stay who held her interest.

She whispered in Nital,  _ “You have to help me teach, I don’t have all the words.” _ She switched to Intsehli. “You want watch, you come train,” she said. “Lesson one: good stick.” She tapped hers on the ground. “Good stick, person tall, little taller. Straight much good. Tall for reach?” She put her hand up over her head. “Bad stick. Go finding good stick, come back. Sanga teach.”

That ate up most of her day. Those who were enthusiastic or just curious enough to put up with anything came back with wood that could make a decent staff. Those who didn’t… didn’t care to learn.

She taught them to stand firm, to brace and block, and that there were two ends to use against an enemy. They learned that getting hit with a staff hurt and that it was a good idea to avoid that. Sanga could stop before she hit someone. They could not do so as easily.

“Learn hit, easy,” she said. “Learn not hit, hard work. Doing hard work, always good.”

If her teachers could see her now… teaching the Way of the Holy Hand to beings they thought of as Demons… They’d have a fit. Well. Maybe not Barrier Denassa, rest her soul. That wrinkled old mischief-maker would not only approve but likely join in.  _ And _ she’d have a bag of little treats somewhere up her sleeve, to hand out to good students.

...come to think of it, that wasn’t a bad idea…

She’d have to find out if there was a universally treasured treat amongst young Intseh and make sure she had a ready supply. Assuming most of them wouldn’t find more interesting things to do than waving a stick around in the sun for most of the day.

Nevertheless, Sanga had an entirely new appreciation for her own teachers once the day was done. Most of them were treating this as something to do while they waited for Ashivon to reappear, and the ones who were picking up Nital were treating it like a secret slang for fun.

She couldn’t blame them. Not really. If she had had friends as a child, and they had all learned some Intsehli, they would also be treating it as a secret tongue.

Sanga had a brief moment of jealousy for these close-knit people before she spied a haunted cart approaching at speed. She stood ready, either to attack the thing or defend the young ones, who had no fear of the strange... beasts? Abominations? Whatever they were, Sanga would not allow them to harm a child.

The haunted cart stopped, and died, and released the single Intseh who had been its captive. A woman who had a rehearsed phrase of Nital. “You are safe. I go in to help Ashivon.” she was a tall one - all Intseh but the young ones were tall - and coloured in tones of sand and dark brown… and quite clearly pregnant.

Well. That might solve the problem of how to get close without triggering another epic hunger event.

Sanga told the gathering children,  _ “Sanga no teach. Sanga go learn.” _ Then rushed to join Ishoverah and this new stranger inside the safety of the house. In the central gathering area, Ashivon was already sort of hiding behind Ishoverah from the new stranger.

_ “Sahnkah, this is Verlisen. She is a healer and weaver of magics.” _

Verlisen offered her hand and repeated a learned phrase, “I go in to help Ashivon.”

Sanga sized her up as not violent and not a threat, since Ashivon wasn’t giving any indicators other than general nervousness. That made her decide to accept the Human greeting and meld it with the Intseh one, including the inhalation of scent that didn’t do much for her Human nose.

Verlisen smelled like most other Intseh to Sanga. Warm fur and sunshine and a little bit of dust. The ozone smell of the haunted carts clung to her a little, as did the scent of herbs and spices.

_ “Is safe, Ashiva.” _ Sanga coaxed him out.  _ “No hurt Ashivon.” _

They sat, and Ishoverah served a heaping pile of protein-rich foodstuffs, and a relatively small bowl of mysterious white cubes for Verlisen.

Ashivon was not hungry. Well, not beyond the normal levels, which he generally ignored. He sat and explained the mark, drawing over the remaining red ribbons on his wrist with a claw held well above his velvet skin. He explained Sanga’s ruptured mark, and how the cut -she turned away at his mimed gestures, not wanting to relive that awful moment- had stopped her power. They had thought that cutting his mark would halt its power…

Sanga was thankful she wasn’t awake to see that. Tselah’s description had been horror enough. The last thing she would ever want was Ashivon literally tearing himself to pieces over her injuries. She joined his side and held the arm that did not contain his mark, as Ashivon made himself as comfortable as he could get in the same room as a stranger.

Verlisen was soothing and gentle, careful to make no sudden moves, and keeping her language simple enough that even Sanga could follow along.


	18. Chapter 18

This was an interesting case. A complicated one, too. Of all the people involved in trying to find out the source of the vanishings, Verlisen had been among the team working on the magical trace. They had done what they could with the sites of the disappearances, but this… Right in front of her were two of the missing. One recent, one cold case, and the latter of the two had the largest magical trace she had ever seen.

The teams had been working on this for centuries. They had ideas, they had conjecture. They had so many failed attempts at stopping it from happening again… and now they had the biggest break they could never have hoped to find.

Tselah’s family were on their way from Varashesihr, but none could identify where Ashivon was from. Not from one name and no other clues.

Nevertheless, she could still help him.

“I’m not going to do anything unless I am certain it won’t hurt you,” she said. Calm, cool, and collected. “The first step is look at the threads of spell work. It’s going to spring out of you, but it won’t hurt. I’ll try to draw it slowly, but… there’s no guarantee it won’t be sudden. Are you all right with this?”

Ashivon held out his arm with the red ribbons on it. “Kill it,” he said. “Kill it all.”

“Ending it suddenly could hurt you worse than it’s already harmed you, I’d rather not do that. The better way is to examine, then unravel.”

The furless one keeping him calm, held his free arm wrapped up in hers and stroked his fur. “No hurt Ashivon,” she said. It sounded like a promise.

“Do it,” he said.

Verlisen took his hand in hers, circling the other over the remains of his mark. Each filament of fur twitched at her movement, and the threads sprang out in a gigantic tangle.

This… was a mess. Generations upon generations working with a pattern of control elements, successively adding without much in the way of understanding. The people who did this had little to no education in spellweaving. It was not a program, it was a tangle of commands mixed with gibberish and pseudoscience.

The egg she was currently gestating would be hatched, and the child grown to nearly Ashivon’s age by the time she would successfully unriddle this on her own. Generations of the furless ones must have come up with this complicated, convoluted mess.

“I can’t be rid of this in a day,” she said. “It’s going to take weeks at best. Months at worst. Teams will have to sort out sections of it just to be sure we’re not causing any harm… and there’s no telling what the side-effects will be.”

"Side effects," said Sahnkah. It was difficult to tell if she was trying to learn a new concept, or asking what that meant.

Verlisen decided to cover all of it in simple terms. "These threads are commands that effect Ashivon. What he does, how he reacts…" an alarming swirl of knotted instructions caught her attention. She carefully plucked them into a semblance of order. "How he grew…" Oh, sweet maker deities. Those were puberty blockers, and that was a lust inhibitor… These were worst-case use only kinds of adjustments, and these furless were using them like a cudgel! Verlisen popped a geo cube to calm her rising gorge. "They made the body grow fast, but… inhibited maturity. Tied everything they didn't want into hunger." She turned to Ishoverah. "You say the ladies have been noticing him?"

"Young and old alike, yes."

That sounded like a perfect recipe for disaster, and in fact it had nearly become one judging by the Buffet Story. It could well become one again. “This is bad, this is very bad. The controls these furless use are… they’re not only a mess, but they’re too strict, too well-enforced. Even if the mark were somehow obliterated, the spellwork has become part of every cell in Ashivon’s body… It’s--” she stumbled for a word. “It’s revolting. Sahnkah? I need to see yours, please.” She furled the mageweave code back to its place within Ashivon and opened her hands to welcome Sahnkah.

“Sanga mark broken,” she said, running a finger over the scar. By the way Ashivon winced, the motion was an echo of how that scar came to be.

“Yes. I need to see the shape of your working, even if it is broken.”

Sahnkah was growing used to the size differences between herself and grown Intseh, and moved herself so that Verlisen could look in her own way.

The marks on her arms were linked to the broken one on her chest, which was a simple spiritual gateway, but… the ink itself… “This is made from abominations…”

Sahnkah looked ashamed. “Sanga knowing.”

Worse news yet, “I don’t know if this  _ can _ be repaired.”

She sighed. “Sanga knowing.”

“Your problems are more than I can help with on my own,” and not just the ones of magical restraints. These two were a mess, psychologically speaking. The physical could probably do with a little bit of checking, too. It seemed unnatural to Verlisen that any intelligent being could be so small when full-grown. “There is an advanced facility in Devaninah, but it is too far to walk.”

Sahnkah reverted to her home tongue,  _ “I am not getting in a haunted cart, even when I’m dead!” _

Ashivon lost his hard-won eloquence. “No ride. Bad thing. Ashivon no liking.”

Tselah delivered the translation of Sahnkah’s words with much rolling of eyes and disappointed sighing, and had something of a conversation with the furless foreigner. Tselah seemed to think that Sahnkah was acting like a child. Well, a smaller child. Sahnkah had obviously not seen anything like the autocarts before and Ashivon didn’t remember them.

“It is important that you see more experts than I. The two of you need  _ teams _ working to help you. We can’t come to you… Ishoverah needs a certain amount of isolation for her treatment, her hormones and body are in a state of change. She needs to become comfortable with her true self.”

Sahnkah turned to Ishoverah. “Sanga… Ashivon…  _ hurt _ Ishoverah?”

“No. It’s the others.” Ishoverah remained calm about it. “Springtime is the worst. My instincts fight with what I know true about myself and…” she shuddered. “It’s best that I stay away from that. I have inhibitor spells for the transition, but… some things are undeniable.”

Ashivon, leading cause of ‘some things’, shrank in his place. “We go. We no hurt. Please? We go slow?”

“Much slow,” added Sahnkah. “No want hurt Ishoverah. Ishoverah good.”

Ishoverah had picked up a few words of the furless tongue.  _ “Sahnkah good. Sahnkah no hurting.” _

Nevertheless, they didn’t take a lot of time packing. They had their travel supplies and a few garments that were gifted to them… Clothing that some of this isolated farm’s former inhabitants had left behind. Some were a little too large for Tselah, but all were either too large or too small for Sahnkah. The rare examples that did fit did not cover Sahnkah to her satisfaction. Which was why she was still wearing the clothes she had left her people in.

The next hurdle, the one that took a majority of the afternoon, was acclimating these two to using an autocart. Or at the very least, voluntarily riding in it.

Getting them to approach it was more painful than a toothache in hot pepper soup.

“It is a thing,” they kept repeating. “Like any other thing. It will not hurt you.”

Tselah quickly gave up on trying to show them an autocart was harmless. Every time he tried to approach Verlisen’s vehicle, either Sahnkah or Ashivon would actively snatch him back away from it, protecting him from what they saw as a dangerous, dark magic artefact.

Showing them herself how harmless it was had little effect. The same with Ishoverah doing a similar demonstration.

“It smells you,” said Ashivon, currently protecting Sanga, who was protecting a very put-upon Tselah. “You have one tame… they don’t battle each other, they won’t battle you.”

As chains of illogic went, it was rather brilliant. It was also a potential breakthrough. “What does it use to get my scent? Come with me and I can introduce you.”

Some patients didn’t need to be told that their afflictions were irrational. They needed instead to work around or with them. Verlisen recalled the tale of a patient who was constantly terrified that her firestarting crystal would ignite something in her home and burn everything she owned and everyone she loved. The solution was as simple as carrying it with her and making certain it was inactive.

Therefore, if Ashivon and Sahnkah thought an autocart was alive… let them. They could ‘make friends’ as they would any other tame animal, and thusly overcome their fears. She got them as far as climbing into the seats and explaining the safety belts with the autocart off. Then the trouble began all over again when she started the motor.

...thrrruuuuUUUUMMM pok pok pok pokatta pokatta pokatta pokatta PAM!

Ashivon and Sahnkah sprang off it -Tselah in their arms- as if it had caught fire. Fetching up in Ishoverah’s doorway, where they peeked out like frightened infants.

“This is  _ so _ ridiculous,” complained Tselah, not bothering to try and wriggle free any more. “You’re acting like  _ babies!” _

Verlisen took another deep breath and began all over again by demonstrating how the now-noisy autocart wasn’t going to hurt her, Ishoverah, or, with one of them holding his hand, Tselah. Ashivon and Sahnkah crept slowly out into the open, flinching at every unexpected  _ PAM! _ of a backfire, but baulked at coming any nearer than three Lunges. They wouldn’t get closer, not even when Tselah clambered up on the autocart and made himself exaggeratedly comfortable.

“What mean--” Sahnkah flinched at another  _ PAM! _ “What mean sound? Roar? Growl?”

_ I am going to need all the backrubs in the world once this is done. My family owes me the best cake, right now. _ “Sound mean… wants carry,” said Verlisen, reverting to Broken Intsehli so they could both understand better. “Wants move. No move until I say. Is safe. Is good.”

Ashivon coiled himself to spring as Sanga edged a small pace closer. It took the better part of half an hour, but they emboldened themselves to touch the autocart and, once the rituals of ‘making friends’ were accomplished, cautiously climb on board. They were edgy and skittish and made small noises of alarm with every  _ PAM! _ but they were prepared to ride.

“We are going to start very slow,” said Verlisen, “and it will make some different noises, but you are safe. It’s not going to hurt you. No hurt. Good?”

They had their doubts, but they nodded.

Verlisen didn’t even touch the accelerator, just released the brakes and allowed the autocart to ease forward. This was almost the same procedure that the mental health team would use for excitable patients who were afraid of the world. Hyper-anxious types who feared anything outside of their sheltered lives. Some could adapt quickly. Some… were exhausting enough to move that the teams helping them preferred not to.

Verlisen checked them over her shoulder. They were tense, but they weren’t stressed. By the time they reached the main road, they might be at ease enough to try a little acceleration. It did  _ not _ help Verlisen’s mood to see small packs of Intseh teens strolling on the footpaths, sometimes trotting, but generally just walking along beside the autocart and drooling in Ashivon’s general direction.

Thank the small gods that they were all  _ downwind. _ She didn’t want a repeat of the Buffet Incident. Not until a team of expert mageweavers could unriddle that despicable tangle of Ashivon’s restraint program.

The small gods should also be thanked that neither Sahnkah nor Ashivon had realised that she should be watching the path and not her passengers. Even at ludicrously slow speeds. Tselah, poor patient child, was between the two of them with the world’s most put-upon expression of endurance and boredom combined.

Once they trundled out onto the road, Verlisen kept to the slow lane and gently applied a little acceleration. Easing off when her technophobic passengers began making frightened noises of protest. Thus, the speed they gradually eased up to was that of a spirited jog, with Verlisen checking them to make sure they weren’t in too much distress.

Tselah dozed off in their arms, a heavy contributing factor to their lack of vocal protest along the way.

It took most of the day, and one wife and their shared husband were waiting with pre-packaged snack foods by the time she got there. Worrywarts. She knew that they knew very well that she packed ample nutrition for the day. Still… they did insist on making sure she had fresher fare somewhere close to her arrival spot.

Ahnmivats clambered up before Verlisen had come to a complete stop. “Was it trying? I told you that you should bring one of us? Are you okay? Any twinges?”

“I’m still brewing the egg, love.” Verlisen nuzzled her wife. “We both know how instinct hacking goes.”

“Eat, you’re growing a new life.”

Ishoteh didn’t hang back for long, wrapping Verlisen up in his arms and inhaling deeply. His rumbling purr meant she was truly home. His scent and Ahnmivats was all she needed to relax.

At least until Tselah started a ruckus because Ashivon and Sahnkah had dived off the Autocart and were hiding from it, deep in the middle of a decorative shrubbery.

Verlisen sighed. “My loves? I bring you the gift of fascinating trouble…”


	19. Chapter 19

Tselah woke up when Ashivon and Sanga left the autocart at speed. First one warm and comforting body vanished, and then the other left as well. He shook himself and saw the last traces of them headed towards a large topiary. For all that they had saved him and protected him in the wilderness, they were absolute  _ idiots _ when it came to a perfectly normal town full of perfectly normal people and perfectly normal things.

“You’re both acting like  _ BABIES,” _ he complained. Marching up to the shrubbery where the two of them were huddled. “It’s just an autocart. It literally  _ can’t _ bite.”

Sanga had picked up a rock almost too big for her hand. Ashivon had his claws out, and both of them were gesturing for him to come and hide with them.

“You are being ridiculous,” he said in both languages. “Calm down. We’re here. We’re not going anywhere any more.”

“Bad place, bad place,” Ashivon was muttering. “Too fast. Too strange. Bad place.”

Sanga used her few words of Intsehli. “Come hide. Be safe.”

Tselah deliberately backed out of their reach and sat on the path. “No. Safe here.” By the gods large and small, he  _ hated _ having to teach grownups like they were babies.

It was a long stare-down, as Learned Verlisen reunited with her family. Ashivon and Sanga were too afraid to leave their improvised shelter, and too fearful of everything to try and snatch Tselah from his exposed perch. Tselah was more annoyed than angry. All the explaining in the world hadn’t changed their minds. Maybe patience might have a chance.

“Tsefa!”

He turned and stared. Those… those were his mothers! He thought he’d never see them again and there they were. And… they had a furless with them. Smaller than him, now, but when the light had taken him from his parents, he had to have been close to that size. The furless were small, and stayed small if Sanga was any indication.

Sanga was the one to gasp and stare as she emerged reluctantly into the open. She spoke Nital for the first time in months.  _ “You were dead, I saw you with the dead…” _

The Human boy, prone to cowering, clung to Tselah’s birth mother.  _ “You won’t take me back?” _

Sanga did something strange. She pulled aside her usual chest covering to reveal the scarred symbol.  _ “I can’t and I won’t,” _ she said.  _ “You are safe, here.” _

By then, Tselah’s other mother had rushed up to embrace him, repeating ‘Tsefa’ and ‘Tsefafa’ over and over again. Once, he swore, she had gone as far as adding  _ four _ ‘fa’s to his name. Which was embarrassing in a way. He clearly wasn’t a baby any more.

He was too glad to see her to put up too much of a fuss about it. Tselah held her tight and breathed her scent and tried not to cry.

Ashivraha, she who had borne him, was gently striving to coax the young Human stranger towards the scene. The human boy was panicking, and everyone panics in the tongue they learned first.

_ “You don’t want me, now. You don’t want me. You have your real son back, you don’t want me… Don’t send me back, please don’t send me back, I don’t want to go back…” _

Ashivraha had knelt to comfort him and now Tsutsivah, his other mother, was carrying Tselah over to them.

Tselah knew what this panicking boy needed.  _ “You are safe. You are loved. My mothers will love you and I both. They will not toss you aside. I promise.” _

Tsutsivah said, “Tselah, this is your new brother,  _ Bottle.” _

He can’t have heard that right.  _ “Your name is Bottle?” _

Lagenam nodded.  _ “Yes. ‘S what Pa always called me.” _

Judging by the look on Sanga’s face, this was not a typical furless name. Tselah said,  _ “You can pick a better one, any time you like.” _ Tselah greeted him in the Human way, then drew him in for a hug and sniff in the Intseh way. He smelled scared, so Tselah held him carefully until Lagenam relaxed enough to start holding him back.  _ “We are brothers,” _ he insisted.  _ “Now and forever.” _

“Shelafa?”

Of all the little gods of corners and spiderwebs… That was Vrisheshio. Walking on two feet and talking first instead of hunting tails. She’d grown so much… Though she was still talking like a baby.

“Vriva… you got big,” he couldn’t help but laugh.

She didn’t so much walk as wobble from foot to foot, with much stomping and little forward motion. Her steps were interrupted twice by sudden upsets and falls onto her bottom, but that didn’t stop her enthusiasm. She just got up and started stomping anew with a bold giggle.

Tselah welcomed her into his arms. Glad to breathe her scent.

“Baby?” Ashivon finally dared edge out of his hiding spot. “Baby!”

Oh dear. “Mothers? There’s a thing you should know about--” he got no further, because Ashivon leaped out of hiding to scoop up Vrisheshio in a fit of manic protective instinct. Now his parents were alarmed. “Ashivon, NO!”

Ashivon wrapped himself around Vrisheshio, looking panicked. He spotted Tsutsivah and drew a direct line between their shared fur patterns and a direct relationship. One spring, two, and he thrust Vrisheshio into her arms. “Guard baby,” he ordered. “Keep safe! Night is danger…  _ guard _ baby.”

Tselah growled under his breath. “He’s been captive of the furless ones,” he said. “He’s more than a little crazy.”

Ashivon scooped up Tselah next, and thrust him into Ashivraha’s arms. “Guard. Baby.”

“He’s been like this the entire trip,” said Tselah. “Just… follow his advice. He’s calmer when he thinks children are protected.”

His birth-mother glared at Ashivon, half a growl coming out of her throat.

Tselah felt compelled to defend the crazy warrior and his furless cuddle-mate. “They saved me from the bad people. Both him and Sanga. They kept me safe, and kept me well. They’ve… they’ve done the same job as the both of you for the many months we were running. They kept watch for every danger. They guarded me in the night, and always let me eat first when there was little food. They taught me what they knew… and in all other ways they have been parents to me when I was alone. They are broken… and crazy… and weird… but they love me and I love them.”

Ashivraha looked Tselah in the eyes. “All right, Tsefafa… We were here to heal Lagenam… we can stay here to heal your new co-parents.”

Lagenam stared at Ashivon. Ashivon stared at Lagenam. Sanga kept repeating the Nital for ‘peace’, but Lagenam was shaking from top to toe.

Lagenam said,  _ “Tormentor…” _

Ashivon knelt on the ground, and put his arms behind his back. Each hand holding the opposite elbow. He said three words in Nital,  _ “No eat child.” _

Sanga repeated the pose, showing Lagenam that they didn’t intend harm.  _ “We will not hurt you.” _

Tsutsivah, seemingly recognising this kind of panic attack, edged around into Lagenam’s view. She used a specific kind of broken Intsehli that Tselah recognised from his early days of communicating with Sanga… or trying to help her understand when she reverted to broken Intsehli. “All safe, little… All safe. No hurting. No hurting now.”

Lagenam took three deep breaths. “Him nightmare,” he said. “Him kill me.”

Verlisen took in the scene and made a statement of utmost understatement. “This is a high stress scenario. We need to unravel everything.”

Ishoteh said, “I will get the newcomers into a suite.”

Tsutsivah said, “Okay. Okay. This is just like the last time, remember? We go into the quiet lounge and we play and speak, yes? This is just… a little bit trickier.”

Tselah, sliding down from his mother’s arms, added, “Yeah, Ashivon’s going to be worried.”


	20. Chapter 20

It’s easy to be angry at something that you don’t understand. Ashivon, however, had spent most of a lifetime with his anger weaponised by the furless and therefore despised it. He didn’t trust anger, and avoided it wherever possible. The next default emotion was therefore fear. It had been a very frightening afternoon, what with the breakneck speeds of the haunted cart, the continuing near-misses with other vehicles speeding by at even faster velocities, the close call with the babies and the potential for them to be Taken like he had…

Now there was a ghost from his own past. The child he had refused to kill, but was forced to kill anyway, when he was beaten halfway to death by the furless.

_ Him nightmare, _ the child had said.

Ashivon remembered that day. His last day in captivity. He should be able to thank this furless boy for the chain of events that resulted in their freedom… but that furless boy was rightfully terrified of him.

So Ashivon knelt, like he used to, with his hands ready for binding… like he used to.

_ When he was nothing more than a captive animal, and only one person who saw him as a person… _

The stench of the arena crept back into his mind. Sun-baked sand and old blood and the unappealing aroma of the crowd. The roars of their cheering, the chants of ‘blood, blood, blood’ as if they had no sympathy for the poor doomed soul there on the sands with him. Someone who had once been a neighbour, a friend, a relative… someone that some of them once knew… now nothing more than another victim in the bloody pageantry of the Church.

“See,” said Sanga.

Ashivon opened his eyes as he looked at her. “I see… Sanga… I see trees, and that…  _ thing…” _ Which was still rumbling and shivering and uttering the occasional angry  _ PAM! _ In the middle of all this chaos. “I see… Verlisen… and the dead boy who’s not dead.”

They were further away, headed into the tall building that had more of its heritage in a termite mound than a snail shell. He could relax, a little, from the submissive pose. He reached out for her just as she reached out for him. The only certainty they had in a world shaken to pieces around them.

“Hear,” said Sanga.

“I hear your voice, the wind, I hear people talking… I hear a bird singing.”

Sanga’s hands smoothed his fur, her fingers pausing at the old scars from the light that once bound him. She blamed herself, he knew. Just as she knew he blamed himself. She said, “Feel.”

“I feel your touch, the hot sun… I feel pebbles under my knees, I should get up.”

A stranger male was watching them. He was with Verlisen, and possibly knew what they were doing with their senses. Behind him, Verlisen killed the haunted cart with an economical motion. Good. One less thing to fret about. If it was dead, then it couldn’t move.

Before they could get up, Sanga said, “Smell.”

For that, he always leaned over and breathed in her scent deeply. Such closeness was never allowed in the Church, so he revelled in it here. Because she valued such privacy, he whispered in her ear, “Your blood time will happen in three days. I don’t know where to get cattails any more.” Louder, he said, “I smell you… I smell… a stranger…”

A stranger who was very pointedly mirroring Ashivon’s kneeling posture, but having considerably more difficulty with it. Though Ashivon had been kneeling like that most of his life, the stranger had not. As they got up, so did the stranger, though he did so with a slight sigh of relief.

“My name is Ishoteh,” he said, tapping his chest. “Ishoteh.” Now he started speaking a carefully broken Intsehli variant. “Follow Ishoteh, going inside. Much safe.”

Ashivon took a deep breath and said, “I’m not stupid. I… revert… when I’m stressed.”

“Yes. My apologies, I didn’t know how much you could understand when you were stressed.” Ishoteh gestured for them to follow. “There are safe spaces inside. Security you can adjust for yourself.”

Sanga’s hand was in his, and the further he got from the haunted cart, the better he felt about it. The next problem was convincing himself that he wasn’t walking into another cage. Ashivon made himself notice that the windows did not have bars, or what doors there were did not have locks. His fellow Intseh did have doors, but they weren’t used the Furless way, to keep living things confined in or out of a space. It looked more like the doors were a fortification against the weather, like shutters on windows. Any privacy was care of a cloth curtain across a portal.

Just like the clinic he had visited more than a week ago, this place’s shaped walls were painted in shades of yellow and grey, with geometric patterns that conveyed paths of movement. This… this was also a medical centre, but one for bigger problems than overgrown toe claws. Longer-term problems, since they had encased residences for extended treatments.

He  _ was _ a longer-term problem.

So, possibly, was the furless child who had survived the arena.

The suite that Ishoteh took them into seemed very minimal and bland. One large bed in a larger bedchamber. Storage nooks embedded in the walls. A central lounge area. A kitchen much like Ishoverah’s. A bath room with a privy, also much like Ishoverah’s. Some things were familiar enough. The decor was bland and in shades of yellow, white, and grey. He got the prescient feeling that he was going to be thoroughly sick of Intseh institutional colours before his healing was done.

The pantry was stocked with long-term ingredients, and some packages that promised to be pre-prepared portions of ingredients for set recipes.

Ashivon didn’t have much familiarity with Intseh cooking. Sanga barely had the basics. Neither of them could yet read Intsehli. He hoped the instructions had pictograms.

As for instructions, the light globes were easy enough to control. Simple gestures across their surfaces could change their intensity or colour as demanded. It was a lot less stress than the haunted carts for sure.

He and Sanga both dumped their packs inside the bedroom and spent an hour just… calming down in each others’ arms. It was not, thank the fates, as bad as the aftermath of Sanga's fall. He could recover himself faster, for all that he loved holding her close… he didn't need to do so.

Time to breathe became time to explore, to talk to each other in Broken Intsehli or Broken Nital of the potential inherent in their space. Time to feel safe. Time to find a verdant courtyard that grew all kinds of wild crops. Ashivon could only guess at the use of some, but there were other Intseh inspecting and harvesting according to their needs. After months of scrounging for whatever they could get, it seemed like paradise. Nature itself condensed into a relatively small space and encased in cream-coloured walls with yellow and grey patterns. The fact that the space was ovoid battled with the equal fact that it was filled with plants, and the lack of the roaring crowd in bleachers around him. Reality won with the added help of Sanga’s hand in his.

There were benches, too. In the sunshine or in the shade. One of which held Ishoteh, patiently waiting for them whilst munching idly on a fruit Ashivon didn’t recognise.

He pointed at a branch on one of the nearby trees. “Go on. You might like them.”

He couldn’t quite reach, and lifted Sanga up to gather an armful of them. Ashivon knelt on the ground, a decent lunge away from Ishoteh, and Sanga hunkered nearby, also cautious.

Ashivon was hungry - he was always hungry - but he made sure Sanga had a share first. He could bite into the tough skin easily, but Sanga’s teeth were too blunt to do more than bruise it. Ashivon let her borrow a claw to open it up.

As for the taste…

There was a memory of salt in the air. A warm hearth and a warmer body supporting his own. A spoon with that taste on it. Black Intseh hands holding a bowl full of orange-coloured mush and…

“I had this before,” he mumbled.

Ishoteh wrote some notes in a thick book. “Mm-hm,” he said knowingly. “I thought so. Any memories that came along with the taste?”

“The air smelled like salt… There was a fire… a hearth… someone was holding me. Feeding me…”

“Salt,” echoed Ishoteh. “That’d put you near Rohvrehvoavan. They’re a coastal people… and they use TK[that fruit] as part of a child’s early introduction to foods.”

Sanga pried a piece away from the tough skin, nibbling at it in the experimental way that she tested anything new. The look on her face showed growing approval.

Ashivon pried more peel off for her. “I… am Rohvrevoavan?”

“Ashivon Rohvrevoavan,” said Ishoteh. “A number of people went missing from the area over the years… there’s a potential for us to reconnect you with your family.”

He had to dig all his claws into the earth to stay where he was. He didn’t know why he had that spike of fear through the entirety of his being, but the urge to flee and hide was almost instinctual.

“Interesting,” said Ishoteh. “What images come into your mind at the word ‘family’?”

Carnius. The man who had been the only other furless to talk to him besides Sanga. The one who brought him food every day. The one who threatened him with a fist every time the other furless threw buckets of chilly water at him to get the blood off his fur. The one who beat him. The one who bound him. The one who dragged him from arena to cage and back again. The one who barked orders and hurt him if he wasn’t quick enough. The only other constant thing in his life that wasn’t the kindness of Sanga.

Ashivon spoke of all of this, and found himself mourning the fact that the furless man was no longer with him.

Ishoteh let him mourn. Sanga comforted him.

“Family is not like that with us. You can see, if you like.” He had a book, kept in a nearby bag, which he opened to show… baby pictures. Proud parents holding an infant. People holding each other. People playing together. An Intseh child biting someone’s tail. In someone’s lap. As the child in the images grew, Ashivon came to a realisation. “This is you…”

“This is my family and I. As I grew, they taught me things I needed to know. They kept me safe, and they made sure I had everything I needed.”

There were so many pictures of the adults holding the child. Not just restraining him, but also helping him… hugging him. There was no fear there. No need to fear. Everyone around this child was working towards making sure that he grew up healthy, happy, and emotionally resilient. He had friends. Family. A place in society and encouragement to follow his dreams.

Ashivon closed the book and handed it back. “I can’t be that. I don’t know how. I’m...” he gestured at the remains of his mark. “I’m stopped.”

“We will be working on that,” Ishoteh promised. “First… we need to achieve a level of stability, to know where your current normal is. Then we need to analyse the restrictions that were out on you. My lov--” he stopped, corrected himself. “Verlisen has told me that the restrictions are an incredible tangle. Did you witness what they did?”

“A furless man put his hand on me and it burned. It didn’t take very long.”

“Hm.” More notes. “They must have invested it beforehand… interesting.”

“It was the first time anyone hurt me,” said Ashivon. “I wanted to run away, but he was holding me so tight… I was afraid of them. They never touched me without pain. Not directly…” He’d almost forgotten, but now? Now it all came rushing back. “They… they spoke Intsehli, but… it was like they only learned a few phrases. ‘For your safety’, and, ‘follow’, and ‘stay’... I kept asking them questions, but that was all they said. It was all…”

Sanga kept running her hand over him. Through his hair, over an ear, down his neck… then she’d break off just to run her fingers along his exposed arm. Deliberately, fearlessly, touching her bare skin to his open hide.

“Thank you for learning,” he told her. He leaned in for her closeness. Forehead to forehead. Arm to arm. Then arms around each other and lips met. The comfort and security of her presence were what he needed, what she freely shared. When he came up for air, he said, “Why is this so exhausting? I fought in the arena for years, and ran and hiked for months… but this? Talking about my pains?”

Ishoteh was staring as he wrote. “What was that?”

“You don’t  _ kiss _ your loves?” Ashivon realised that he had used a Nital word. He just didn’t have the same word in Intsehli.

“We… show affection differently,” Ishoteh allowed. “Usually… adults do that for infants, to give nourishment. Is this something you kept? Or… a behaviour you learned from-- er…” he gestured with his pencil to Sanga.

“Sanga people do,” said Sanga. “For loving. For close. For good feeling.” She kept petting Ashivon’s arm. “Ashivon needing all.”

“I agree,” said Ishoteh.

His therapy had just begun.


	21. Chapter 21

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Short chapter today. Long-ish one tomorrow

It took two weeks to fall into something of a routine. Neither Sanga nor Ashivon knew how to use the Intseh pre-packaged foods, though they were learning via another therapist called Mahtchenen. She was an older matriarch who trailed children and grandchildren almost constantly, and though Sanga looked for her markings, they were hard to make out. The lighter fur had darkened with age in random spots, and the darker fur had turned grey with equal randomness. The overall effect was that the old lady had turned completely blue.

The young ones picked up Nital quickly, which helped immensely with translating. Tselah was bonding with family members new and old, and the newest one was not in favour of going anywhere  _ near _ Ashivon. Sanga didn’t blame him. If she thought Ashivon had killed her, she’d be terrified of him, too.

Food helped settle Ashivon and the struggle was to get them both accustomed to regular meals and regulated serving sizes. Mahtchenen explained -through her younger translators- that the both of them had disordered eating habits. Ashivon through his mark and Sanga through her Saintly ideals of sacrifice and starvation as a sign of purity.

The Saint may well have lived off a single, miraculous berry per day, but Sanga was no saint. She had to eat like a regular person.

It was on the third such week of their routines that Mahtchenen and her associates took them into a viewing room to examine the web structure of Ashivon’s mark in full. It was a big, dim room and, when the threads were pulled out of him, they glowed in the gloom. Intseh swarmed, chattering about what they found there to the point where it all became a senseless flow of intermingled babble. Sanga didn’t see when Verlisen entered, but when the pregnant Intseh came into her field of notice…

Sanga sprained something not yelping and shrinking away. It had only been three weeks, but she looked as though she were three  _ months _ further along!

“You big,” she gasped. “Is hurt?” Sanga resisted the urge to feel for kicks. She wasn’t a Barrier any more. She wasn’t a nurse. She probably wasn’t even welcome to touch. Sanga knew for a fact that some mothers were sick of being groped.

“I am not in pain,” she said. “This is alarming for you?”

“How is get big fast? You size… three moons… being three weeks.”

She said, “We are not like you,” as if that answered everything.

Sanga couldn’t ask her any more, simply because her spouses swarmed and ushered her away to a comfortable chair where she could work on taking notes.

Ashivon’s thread web was enormous. Teams of Intseh were weaving bubbles of light around some of the little knots in the thread, peppering Ashivon with questions. Too many questions. He wanted to get rid of his mark, that was for certain, but… this was testing his limits.

Sanga intervened, weaving her way between Intseh experts to hold his free hand and help him maintain his centre. “One go time,” she demanded. “One go time! Let him  _ breathe!” _

For a moment, it looked like she might have to fight them.

Then they gathered away from Ashivon and started treating him like a person instead of a test subject. Mahtchenen explained -through her younger translators- that scientists were often like children when they got their hands on something new. They wanted to explore it to the fullest in the shortest amount of time and damn the consequences.

This was just the  _ analysis _ stage. Getting rid of it all would be a herculean effort. Just identifying the knots that were complete rubbish was going to take them all weeks.

Sanga would rather burn alive than leave Ashivon to deal with all that alone.


	22. Chapter 22

There were entire weeks when Ashivon was glad of Sanga’s hand. Having her close helped him endure everything that came at him during that time. In the long run, it was boredom that was the chief battle. Over the short term… it was the questions.

“Do you feel anything different now?”

“What does this do to your senses?”

“Is this anger?”

“Do you remember anything more now?”

They were mapping which chains of knots did what by a process of elimination. Isolating some parts from the tangled whole. It was slow and creeping progress and Ashivon barely knew how, if at all, he could help them.

There was a new figure lurking in a doorway. Small, not shaped like an Intseh, but rather… like Sanga. Every line of his body told him that that small figure was terrified.

Ashivon hung his head. He knew what they had made him do. He had never wanted to do it, but… There was a horror from the control. Watching his body do things as if from the wrong end of a very long tunnel. Wanting to scream out, wanting to fight, and only receiving pain as any sign that he was still connected to his flesh.

He wanted that control to be sliced away from him. He couldn’t even cut off his arm to get rid of it, for all that that had once seemed like a tempting option. It even seemed like a halfway decent temptation, even now. His claws hovered over the remains of his mark, but it wasn't just Sanga's.

Lagenam, the boy the Church made him almost kill, also laid a restraining hand on Ashivon's own.

It was so small and pale against his dark fur.

“You didn’t want to do it,” he said. “I remember. You kept saying,  _ No eat child. _ They beat you for that and then…”

Ashivon traced the diamond that his mark used to be. “This… let them do that. I do not want to be controlled like that again.”

Lagenam let go. “Tselah says you tried to be a good  _ Pa.” _ He fiddled with his clothes. New, clean clothes made by Intseh hands. All his remaining scars had had the better part of a year to heal, and there were none that were newer. “I think you’re like all the others here. You don’t want to hurt anyone. So… I’m going to try to not be scared of you any more.”

Ashivon said, “You’re right to be afraid. I’m still a monster.”

Lagenam’s careful fingers found the mark’s remnants. “Only because of this. It’s going to be gone. Maybe soon. Maybe later. Then you won’t be a monster any more.”

“I… don’t know… how long that’s going to be.”

“Neither do we. The people here say I’m… broken. On the inside. They’re working to help me just like they’re working to help you. Healing takes time.”

Sanga nodded. “Healing takes a  _ lot _ of time.”

Tselah came into the room, too. With careful tread, lest he disturb the experts working on Ashivon’s mark. “You’re not supposed to be here,” he whispered. “It’s a big trigger, the doctors said.”

Lagenam smirked as he let go of Ashivon. “Now if I can’t meet  _ all _ of your parents, then what good is all that therapy?”

Somewhere, off in the crowd, someone had a revelation. “I think I found the hunger trigger node. Let’s isolate and see if I’m right. Ready, Ashivon?”

Mahtchenen realised there were children where few children belonged. “Hup. Out, you two. This is a dangerous area. Out into the garden. Hup-up and out. Shoo.”

The children fled, true, but they fled giggling.

Neither of them feared pain from their elders, here. That? That was a revelation so huge that he had to comprehend it in little pieces. It took him so much effort that he almost didn’t notice when his team of Intseh mage-scientists started isolating the knots in his threaded, tangled mage-code. They weren’t cutting it, not yet. The first step was to render it useless, to see if they were correct. Only once they were certain, would they begin to prune that massive, tangled tree of illogic and tangled threads.

Sanga handed him a small bowl full of a rich paste, and pressed the spoon into his free hand.

“What?”

“Ashivon feeling hungry?”

For the first time since  _ they _ had thrown him in a cage… he wasn’t. His stomach was quiet and he didn’t feel like eating. “No hungry,” he wondered, then corrected himself. “No hunger. I’m not hungry.” He smiled and laughed. “I’m  _ not _ hungry, Sanga! Not even a little!”

“Good,” she said. “Test two.” Without any further warning, she took the hand she was holding and used it to prick a drop of blood out of her finger.

“SANGA! NO!”

Ashivon felt the anger flare up, but… not as much of it. There was no hunger, still. “Why Sanga do?” he raged. “No hurt! No hurt Sanga!” He was… more upset than angry. Furious that it was  _ his _ claws that hurt her. Unable to exact revenge. Wanting to lash out, but having no avenue where he could do so.

She put that pierced finger to her lips and the rage ended there. Like killing an autocart.

Ashivon was left gasping and confused.

“We are still working on the anger, foolish furless,” chided Mahtchenen.

“Sanga no want hurt Ashivon. Trust Ashivon. Ashivon no hurt Sanga.”

Ashivon leaned into her embrace, purring a little. “Sanga no hurt Sanga?”

_ Now _ she was properly contrite and apologetic. Cringing from the shame of it.  _ “I didn’t mean it,” _ she murmured in Nital.  _ “I’m so sorry.” _

He accepted her into his arms with a soft and grateful purr. “Us no hurt each other,” he insisted, “Us no hurt our selves.”

“Yes,” she agreed. “Promise.”

He relaxed enough to forget that there were people watching him and messing with his mark. Relaxed enough to met her lips with his.

_ Something new stirred inside him. Something tantalising, and entrancing and unfamiliar. _ He was used to his hunger flaring up when he kissed Sanga, but this time… something interesting and almost addictive lurked under his heart.

When he came up for air, the experts were pointing at things and chatting animatedly.

This was it. This was where they announced there would be even more complications.

Ashivon waited, holding close to Sanga for reassurance as well as the verges of temptation that her presence bought him. He didn’t know what it meant nor what to do if he did, but he liked it. He liked the new thrill her scent gave him. He found it fascinating. Hypnotising.

They spent hours arguing, and eventually packed up the threads of spellwork.

Very serious faces ushered them into a more comfortable setting. The gardens, where there was always food of one kind or another. Someone’s baby, clad only in absorbent pants, wobbled uncertainly after something Ashivon couldn’t make out. There was a family of adults nearby, watching the little one. They were far enough away for privacy, but Ashivon still insisted on keeping a weather eye on the baby.

Mahtchenen sat with him, watching the baby intermittently. Something startled the child and all its fur fluffed up as it bared its teeth. The adults closer to the child were amused, and not alarmed. “The good news,” said Mahtchenen with a sigh, “Is that we’ve unriddled  _ most _ of the spellwork in your mark. We can turn it off…. We can turn most of it off…”

“Bad news?” said Sanga.

“The bad news is  _ what _ it also turns off. There have been controls on… Ashivon’s maturity.”

It came out slowly, mostly because they had to pass through Sanga’s level of understanding. The spells tangled up in his mark let him grow to full size, but the hormonal maturity was stopped cold at pre-puberty levels. The Church did not want a fully adult male Intseh scenting out a Human woman’s fertility and… well... Acting on instinct.

The Church wanted a killer, not a lover. Though the rougher aspects of that angle had a temporary appeal, demons should never be seen enjoying themselves, even if it came at the cost of anyone else’s terror.

So they stopped any of that from happening.

As the spellwork experts snipped threads, the hormonal aspect of Ashivon’s maturity would kick in, doing what they should have done in the first place.

“He may grow more,” said Mahtchenen. “Taller. Wider. More muscular. We… can’t stop that. It’s more or less a second puberty.”

The real problems would occur when Ashivon entered sexual awareness. He had little education to begin with, though they were working on that part, they would have to cram  _ years _ of education into as little time as possible.

“For both Ashivon  _ and _ yourself, Sanga. We’ve noticed your… cultural inhibitions. Intseh… can’t be like that. We are open. You need to take down your walls because keeping them up will almost definitely end up hurting Ashivon.”

“What? I don’t want to hurt him. I’d never hurt him.”

“You fear sex,” said Mahtchenen, getting to the core of it. “He’ll want a closeness you are currently unprepared for and… You’ll flinch. He’s bonded with you, Sanga. He will want  _ you, _ and only you.”

“That is true,” said Ashivon. “I don’t have any interest in any other Intseh. Not… not like that. They… don’t smell as good.”

“It’s already starting,” noted Mahtchenen. “We can come up with a program, but… Ashivon’s biology is going to dictate how fast some courses are.”

The baby was back with its parents, who were taking turns keeping it close. Good. Ashivon could relax about that and pay closer attention. “How would Sanga hurt me?”

“You will want to be closer than she is prepared to be,” said Mahtchenen. “Certain parts of bonding involve scent prompts from the partner and… her body may be telling you  _ yes please _ when she herself is telling you  _ no thank-you. _ That conflict is… difficult to resolve at the best of times and this--” her gesture encapsulated the two of them. “--is not the best situation at all.”

Sanga said, via translators, “I’m guessing we should start immediately.”

“We should have started yesterday,” grumbled Mahtchenen. “We should have started when you came to us…” she tutted. “Can’t be undone. The best time to move is now.”


	23. Chapter 23

The classes happened in their quarters, between tentative bonding sessions with Tselah’s family. Sanga, well aware of what was overdue, was increasingly aware of how close she was to Ashivon on the sort of couch thing that Mahtchenen and her translators had them corralled on. Since she had been told, she had noticed all kinds of things.

How Ashivon would sniff her, in passing or in greeting, and how his responses to her scent were growing less practical and more affectionate.

He had always held her close since their escape, but now his night-time embraces included nuzzling and caresses. She wasn’t  _ complaining _ about the attention, and had sleepily kissed him more than once, but…

Sanga was increasingly afraid that she was in no way prepared for anything resembling a next step. Her lessons on sex from the Church had been… mortifying. The girls were segregated from the boys and given a lecture on how to lie and that any pain was a good mother’s burden. How submission and humility to a husband was a good woman’s duty. They were told about menses, as a curse from some evil that the Saint was not completely successful in fighting. Motherhood was the blessing of the Saint. Only those who swore chastity to the Church were honoured in bleeding on behalf of all mothers.

Having attended a vast number of births, Sanga had been certain that there were essential parts missing in that nominal education. She had learned more about how gestation and birth worked than the Church had ever taught her.

Now, she was learning all over again.

“These are pictures of naked, adult Intseh,” the lesson began.

Sanga covered her eyes as the cards came down. Peeking between her fingers. She had seen male parts, before. Usually with drastic infections on them. She truly was not prepared.

“Oh, look and learn, Sahnkah!” A translator chided. “These are pictures. They will not bite.”

She had seen worse - and more mortifying things - in the healer’s halls, certainly.

The females did not have horns. The males did. Neither had breasts like a human would. There was little to discern them apart until her ashamed eyes went below the waist. The female image had what Sanga thought of as a familiar split, but the male… had a pouch of sorts instead of the usual human equipment.

“These are… what you might call the default. There are variations and complications, but this is… the streamlined version.”

Sanga understood. She had met and understood Ishoverah. The Church might have taken a dim view of anyone like that, but it was increasingly clear that she wasn’t in the Church any more.

They focussed on the male Intseh aspect of things, since Ashivon wasn’t interested in any female Intseh. What things he could expect to happen, and what sensations he could experience as the spell over him was untangled.

Sanga did her best to take notes. Symptoms, treatments, how to comfort the patient. How best to respond. It seemed very mechanical when she accepted it like that.

Then there was an extended silence and the teachers surrounding her were in learning mode. They handed her drawing tools and one of the young translators said, “Small pieces, please.”

They wanted to learn about Human biology.

She was the nearest expert.

Sanga immediately turned crimson and lost control of her breathing. She surely had an opportunity to teach everything she knew, but… drawing it? Herself?

She’d seen plenty, but the Church never encouraged women to be artists.

She could focus on her side of things. Yes. That was far less mortifying than the other side.

Sanga began by drawing the cycle of the moon, and explaining her cycle of blood and what it meant…

* * *

The madness of Spring seemed to have worn off the larger populace. Those who wanted little ones were busily gestating and  _ most _ males had returned to trustworthy sanity. Mahtchenen had her doubts about Ashivon. Sahnhah and her perpetual fertility had the potential to keep him in a state of rut all year, ready and willing to couple at the drop of a hat. Males were not exactly at their best mental performance in the middle of a rutting state of mind. It was the main reason why the women ran everything.

There were ancient, cautionary tales about masculine rampages and, coupled with Ashivon’s quote-unquote training as a combat-based executioner, the whole mess might not turn out very well. In the cases of extreme bonding, a rut-addled male was most likely to protect their bonded mate with literally everything they had at their disposal.

Mahtchenen had seen the results of Ashivon’s tests. He was stronger, faster, and had more endurance than the average male Intseh. Add to that whatever this second puberty was going to do and… there could be deaths.

_ Civilised _ masculine combat stopped when one combattant got hurt or backed off or both. Ashivon had been taught-trained-forced to go for the kill. He had only resisted that once, and it had almost cost himself and Sanga their lives. That was one hell of a deterrant against holding off on murder.

The smartest thing to do, of course, was to keep Ashivon the hell away from potentially murder-filled situations. Tselah and the young human Lagenam would be safe near him, but… that might wear off in time. Instincts were trouble when they were strong, and Ashivon might view teen or older young males as potential rivals on instinct. That would have to be watched carefully. They would have an opportunity to bond, still, and that was a good thing.

The entire team would have some uphill work to render Ashivon safe even in a state of permanent rut. He had never learned to tone down his instincts or use reason above his emotions. He didn’t know where to begin and bio-hacking could only work for half the year…  _ if _ it didn’t result in further troubles.

Speaking of troubles, even with the best possible education, tensions could lead to a truly awkward and uncomfortable experience. Which meant re-opening the annex facility at Ehrachavan and moving some experienced counsellors in.

Those two were going to  _ need _ some experienced counsellors.

The more of that mark they untangled and erased, the more trouble this was going to be. Mahtchenen could feel it… but not nearly so much trouble as moving those two all the way to Ehrachavan. They were  _ terrified _ of autocarts, and called them  _ ghost carts _ if they talked about them at all. Hauling two grown people to the hot mountain springs… Hiking would take time they didn’t have. Some of Ashivon’s spell-forms were unravelling on their own.

On one hand, she was wont to complain about the shoddy spellwork, but on the other… those were some gods-damned unhealthy spells etched into his being.

They were going to have to get inventive if they wanted to move Ashivon and Sahnkah without causing another major upset and a setback of forty-eight hours whilst the two of them calmed back down to normal levels.

Mahtchenen began picking her teams. Young, immature ones for translating, old and experienced ones for the actual teaching. Experts in spell-threads. Experts in deviant psychology. Anyone who had any information at all about the Humans. There were some traders who came by the outer cities. They didn’t speak Nital as far as Mahtchenen knew, but… the topic had never come up before.

So much to arrange… and so little time to arrange it in.

She hated conference calls, since they cut off the essential scent factor, but… this  _ was _ an emergency. They needed as many voices reasoning as many logical solutions as they could, as quickly as they could.

There was no indication of how quickly the sand of Ashivon’s personal hourglass would run out, so to speak. The sooner they got him and Sahnkah to Ehrachavan,  _ with _ the team of experts, the better.


	24. Chapter 24

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the last I've got to share with you for a while.

The solution was something like an omnibus. Or rather, a trailer that was kind of like an omnibus. A covered wagon with plush, comfortable seating and, if the view disturbed, panes that could be covered with curtains or blinds on the inside. It was a relic of a former age when almost all Intseh were terrified of autocarts and feared any kind of illogical consequences of faster, sustained travel.

In the earliest days of its use, passengers would board the vehicle before the pulling autocart was brought out of hiding and hitched up. That level of deception wouldn’t work on Ashivon nor Sanga, who actually feared the explosive backfire sounds of the autocart engine. For them, just being in the passenger wagon was enough distance from the ‘dangerous’ autocart.

This particular wagon was a replica of a museum piece. The original owner had allowed a team of nerds to build the new one from scratch and a  _ different _ team of nerds had had a friendly battle over who got to pilot the entire arrangement up to Erachavan. The alleged losers of this competition were all gathered around like scavengers to watch history in motion.

Tselah’s family were casually packing bags onto it, though his baby sister Vrisheshio was bouncing in and out of it in a fit of baby-excitement. Lagenam was more seriously inspecting the structure, much like Sanga was.

The Sanden family, their therapists, Ashivon and Sanga… all in one vehicle. All the way to Erachavan. Travelling slowly and carefully to help ease the concerns of the more easily-disturbed outsiders. Worse, news of Sanga’s Church and the horrors they had performed was getting around. People were getting concerned. People were trying to connect the missing children with some kind of time scale. Just a month before Ashivon appeared near Dasalehravan, another child had vanished in bizarre circumstances. Some concerned parties were talking about going to war.

That would be trouble that Ashivon, especially, didn’t need… but Sanga? Sanga could tell them much about the Church peoples, and how best an army might approach. Intseh, at least, valued life in more than the performative ways that the Church seemed to. They would much prefer that any conflict be resolved with a minimal loss of life.

Mahtchenen was moderately certain that the Humans didn’t think the same way.

That was trouble for another day.

Today, they were working on the trouble they already had, which was Ashivon’s… maturity resolution.

The humans, young and old, had weighed the passenger cart in the balance and found it worthy. They would ride and not fear. Good. So would Ashivon. Better.

Everything else was a tangle that would have to sort itself out as it happened. There were experts enough to handle everything; even one who, with Ashivon’s given consent, could send him into an artificial slumber if things went bad on the way there.

They had done everything they could. Prepared everything they could.

The best they could all do was work with what they had.

Mahtchenen waved them off, secretly praying to the small gods of serendipity and synchronicity, that what they had would be plenty.

New families were never easy.

END!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for staying with me to the end. The next Dibbles story will be the last owing to the fact that I can't think of any more three-word sentences that have all words starting with W's. I _MAY_ be tempted to write more in the Assumptions AU, but that will likely happen much later.
> 
> If you want to keep track of what passes a life in my neck of the woods, or wish to find out what else I do with my time, do please check out internutter (dot) org as I have links to literally everything else I'm doing with my precious time over there.
> 
> Bless you all, and may you always find exactly what you need, when you need it, at a price you can easily afford.


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